The Challenges of Implementing Sustainable Production for One-Way Bottled Drinking Water in Thailand

摘要

The paper presents evidence-based evaluation of a sustainable production of one-way bottled drinking water in Thailand with emphasis on open-loop and close-loop processes. Two groups of producers were selected: four top brands and four house brands. In-depth interviews and plant surveys were conducted to explore the producers' performances in four categories: corporate social responsibility (CSR), sustainable design, 3 R's principle and life-cycle management (LCM). The interview and survey transcripts were combined, analyzed and categorized for two sustainable production measures: resource efficiency and pollution reduction. Three most prominent findings are that the top brands moderately perform the sustainable production while the house brands do less well, the resource efficiency measure is much more valued than the pollution reduction, and that the LCM is the most favored category, unlike the CSR. In conclusion, both brands are challenging for improving water efficiency and increasing plastics recyclability and the close-loop process shall be largely adopted among Thai bottled water producers.