Packaging / Advertising & Office

Shanghai Xinghualou Food Group is a time-honored brand in Shanghai. Its mooncakes have always been favored by consumers due to their unique formulas. On February 1, 2021, Shanghai Xinghualou Food Co., Ltd. and Shanghai Xinghualou Food Marketing Co., Ltd. were approved by the China Biodiversity Conservation and Green Development Foundation (hereinafter referred to as Green China Development Conference) sued, demanding that it stop harming the ecological environment and reclaim mooncakes sold on the market that do not meet the national packaging standards.

On August 3, a reporter from Upstream News (WeChat ID: shangyounews) learned from the Green Hair Association that in the first-instance judgment, although the court found that it had excessive packaging behavior, it did not believe that excessive packaging would cause damage to the ecological environment. Only Shanghai Xinghualou paid relevant reasonable expenses of 30,000 yuan. Currently, the Green Development Council has filed an appeal.

Over-packaged moon cakes are accused of harming the ecological environment

Shanghai Xinghualou is a well-known time-honored brand in Shanghai, with a history of nearly a hundred years, among which mooncakes are the most famous. On February 1 this year, Shanghai Xinghualou Food Co., Ltd. and Shanghai Xinghualou Food Marketing Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Shanghai Xinghualou) were sued by the Green Development Association for moon cakes being accused of excessive packaging.

The relevant person in charge of the Green Hair Association, Ma Yong, introduced that according to relevant national regulations, the packaging of moon cakes must not exceed 3 layers, while the moon cake packaging of Shanghai Xinghualou has been identified as having 4 layers, which obviously violates relevant national regulations. Excessive packaging will inevitably lead to a waste of resources. If the packaging is not handled properly in the later stage, it will also cause environmental pollution and other situations.

According to the evidence provided by the Green Hair Association, on September 9, 2020, the Green Hair Association purchased several moon cakes from Shanghai Xinghualou through the e-commerce platform "Xinghualou Food Flagship Store". According to the inspection by the Product Quality Inspection Institute, one of the Xinghua Louhuayu moon cake packaging gift boxes has 4 layers, which has exceeded the 3 layers stipulated in the current national mandatory standard GB23350-2009 "Restrictions on excessive packaging requirements for products and cosmetics" .

Upstream news reporters noticed that the moon cake packaging mentioned by the Green Hair Club is composed of a plastic inner box, a sealed bag, a single packaging box and a gift box. There are 4 individually packaged moon cakes in a gift box.

The Green Hair Association believes that the production and sales of Shanghai Xinghualou do not meet the standards, and there are over-packaged moon cake gift boxes, which wastes limited resources. For example, improper disposal of excess packaging will cause secondary pollution to the ecological environment. His behavior has violated the "Environmental Protection Law", "Solid Waste Pollution Prevention and Control Law" and other relevant regulations.

For this reason, the Green Hair Association hopes that the court will order Shanghai Xinghua Tower to immediately stop the damage to the ecological environment, that is, stop the production and sale of moon cakes that do not meet the national packaging standards; immediately recall moon cakes sold on the market that do not meet the national packaging standards. Eliminate environmental damage; at the same time, Shanghai Xinghua Building is ordered to take measures to repair or alternatively repair the ecological environment damage caused by its illegal activities. If it cannot be repaired, it shall bear the cost of ecological environment restoration; and report to the media at or above the provincial level. The whole society publicly apologized.

▲Evidence submitted by the Green Hair Association shows that the Shanghai Xinghualou moon cakes are packed with 4 layers, which obviously violates the national compulsory regulations. Source/Respondent's Picture

Xinghualou said the incident had been rectified on its own

On May 20, the case was publicly heard in Shanghai No. 3 Intermediate People's Court. Regarding the litigation request of the Green Hair Association, Shanghai Xinghualou believed that the excessive packaging was due to the cause.

During the trial, Shanghai Xinghualou stated that there were reasons for the excessive packaging of moon cakes involved. Earlier, due to consumer complaints, the outer carton of moon cakes delivered by express delivery was damaged by rain, and the cause of the epidemic was superimposed, causing consumers to seriously worry about the food safety of moon cakes. For this reason, Shanghai Xinghualou Company temporarily added a layer of plastic film outside the carton packaging during the production process of some Huayu moon cakes. This behavior is purely an emergency behavior under the background of the epidemic, and the duration is short. The film is added. The number of mooncakes is extremely limited. And the material of the sealing film is recyclable and usable, and there is no real danger of causing damage to the environment or causing damage to the ecological environment.

Shanghai Xinghualou also mentioned that it had recalled moon cakes with over-standard packaging before the Mid-Autumn Festival of 2020 and had already corrected the error by itself. In addition, from 2019 to 2020, the Shanghai Municipal Market Supervision Administration's report and results of sampling inspections of various mooncakes on the market in Shanghai Xinghualou showed that there was no waste of resources and excessive packaging in pursuit of luxury. Shanghai Xinghualou also promised in court that in the future, it will take a lesson and learn from it, and will never make the same mistake again.

Regarding the request of the Green Hair Association to recall moon cakes that did not meet the standards and to carry out ecological restoration, Shanghai Xinghualou believes that it has not committed environmental infringements, and the moon cakes have distinctive seasonal characteristics, and the Green Hair Association's litigation request is unrealistic.

The court believes that there is no violation of the ecological environment, the Green Hair Association appeals

According to the "Civil Judgment" of Shanghai Third People's Court (2021) Hu 03 Min Chu No. 109, the existing evidence provided by the Green Hair Club can only prove that the packaging layers of Huayu moon cakes do not meet the national compulsory standards. In the case of one-layer packaging, although the extra packaging is solid waste, which increases the total amount of domestic waste, it cannot be equated with pollutants, and it cannot be simply considered that Shanghai Xinghualou’s violations have caused the environment. Infringement. And there is no evidence to prove that Shanghai Xinghua Tower alone or in combination with each other has caused environmental pollution to the atmosphere, water bodies or soil or has a high realistic risk of causing environmental pollution or ecological damage. Therefore, there is no environmental infringement.

At the same time, the court held that the production and sales of mooncakes have distinct seasonal characteristics. The production and sales of mooncakes in 2020 have long been over, the production and sales season of mooncakes in 2021 has not yet arrived, and Shanghai Xinghualou stopped its sales before the Mid-Autumn Festival last year. , So the purpose of the litigation has been achieved. In addition, moon cakes are foods with a certain shelf life. The moon cakes produced last year have expired and consumers should have already dealt with them. Therefore, there is no realistic possibility of fulfillment of the recall lawsuit.

In response to the request of the Green Development Association to order Shanghai Xinghua Tower to take measures to repair or alternatively repair the ecological environmental damage caused by its illegal activities, because there is no evidence to prove Shanghai Xinghua Tower's specific damage to the atmosphere, water flow or soil And the specific area that caused environmental damage, and lack of relevant evidence, the court was unable to conduct appraisal and evaluation. Therefore, the court held that although Shanghai Xinghualou’s behavior violated the national mandatory administrative regulations on the number of packaging layers, it did not constitute an environmental infringement. , Nor does it cause environmental damage or have a highly realistic risk of causing ecological environmental damage.

In the end, the court ruled that because Shanghai Xinghualou voluntarily assumed the reasonable cost of 30,000 yuan in the public interest litigation, it ruled that Shanghai Xinghualou paid 30,000 yuan to the Green Development Association and rejected the other claims of the Green Development Association.

Regarding the result of the judgment, the relevant person in charge of the Green Hair Association believes that pollutants can be divided into waste gas, wastewater, solid waste, noise, electromagnetic radiation, etc. according to the form. "Solid waste (discard)" is obviously a type of pollutant. In addition, according to relevant laws and regulations, environmental infringement applies to the inversion of the burden of proof. The Green Hair Association has submitted preliminary evidence that Shanghai Xinghualou violates the law and has the risk of causing damage to the environment, so Shanghai Xinghualou should prove that its actions did not pollute the environment, damage the ecology, or do not pollute the environment or damage the ecology. The risk of damage. However, in this case, Shanghai Xinghualou did not cite any evidence to prove how these excessive packaging materials did not pollute the environment, damage the ecology, or have no risk of environmental pollution or damage to the ecology.

At present, the Green Hair Association has filed an appeal.