On October 14, 2022, the Standardization Administration of China published an interpretation of the newly revised national standard, Packaging recycling marking (GB/T18455-2022) (hereinafter referred to as “the revised standard”). This new revision was published on July 11^th, 2022, and is based on the currently effective standard GB/T 18455-2010 Packaging recycling marking. The revised version of the standard aims at promoting China’s green packaging development and supporting garbage sorting and recycling.

The purpose of the new standard is to save raw resources and reduce environmental pollution via the clear identification and marking of all types of packaging materials.

The main contents of the revised standard are summarized as follows:

One of the most consistently recognizable recycling designs would be used on all types of paper packaging such as: snack boxes, mobile phone packaging, toy bricks packaging, paper boxes and delivery packaging etc.

This design would used on plastic packaging and plastic packaging products. Such packaging would be segmented by its raw materials. 

The marking contains a number in the centre and an abbreviation of the packaging material at the bottom, which includes but is not limited to: