The basis of JSC Gerovė business is circular economy. That means they use recycled materials in their manufacturing process, and the products can be reused and recycled.

Gerovė recycles and uses up to 2,000 tonnes of plastic materials per year to manufacture such products as waste bags, film in rolls, industrial packaging and packaging for retail companies.

In 30 years of the company’s existence, it has always operated in a socially responsible manner, encouraging customers and community to sort their waste, to reuse products and to recycle everything that can be recycled.

Company’s expert team keeps up with the global trends and innovations and applies new technologies to present products as well as create new products. One of these new recently developed products is biobased waste bags. These bags are made using plastic derived from sugarcane and are 100% recyclable.

FlexBlow, chosen as Lithuanian exporter of the year for 10 consecutive years, has started year 2021 stronger than ever before. The company managed not only to deal with the global challenges brought by 2020, but also to turn them into new opportunities and increase manufacturing capacity by almost 20 per cent.

FlexBlow manufactures the world’s most flexible PET stretch blow moulding machines, offers turn-key solutions for bottling and blow moulding industries, installs and services complete bottling lines, analyses and develops container and preform designs.

Tackling the issues in the global supply chains, the company expanded its service and distribution network to the USA, Europe, Saudi Arabia and Japan. In response to the world going online, FlexBlow also solidified its on-site and online services by offering 24/7 live video support, online monitoring, maintenance and system upgrades on top of its local services.

“Alongside our main business, last year we’ve responded to the global demand related to COVID-19 issues by cooperating with scientists in developing and manufacturing plastic face shields (visors). We are currently working on a new protective solution – engineering and prototyping innovative protective shields,” says Gintautas Maksvytis, the CEO of the company.

FlexBlow has already expanded R&D and manufacturing capacity during the peak of the pandemic. The company launched a new 3,200 square meter plant at the very end of 2020. It has around 1,000 sq m dedicated solely to engineering, prototyping and testing, and 3,000 sq m, to the manufacturing of blow moulding systems. “Thanks to our recent increase in capacity, we now have a large part of all manufacturing processes automated; we’ve also secured our positions in in-house mould production, in-house container and preform prototyping and real-life testing. This business decision definitely made us a strong player in bringing complete solutions for customers in the bottling and packaging industry,” stresses Mr Maksvytis.
The company is constantly seeking to attract competent employees. Engineers, CNC operators, programmers, service technicians and developers willing to join a growing highly-skilled team are always welcome at FlexBlow.

2021 marks an extraordinarily productive and significant year for cluster member UAB Hoda, one of the largest plastic injection moulders in the Baltics, with 3 new clients having joined the pool of its 137 regular customers. Subject to the projects being implemented on time as scheduled, the head of the company Raimundas Gražys estimates that “it is planning to reach over 20 million in turnover for the first time in the company’s history.”

Like other industries, UAB Hoda has been facing a shortage of raw materials used for manufacturing purposes during the pandemic period; however, the company’s technologies manager Egidijus Gražys claims that there is an ongoing search for alternatives so as to avoid disappointing customers and delayed deliveries of production. As it stands now, the company manages to fulfil its orders on time as it has put efforts to ensure the supply of necessary raw materials via its own channels. The second challenge faced by the company at this moment is a shortage of technical staff holding the necessary expertise. It is expected, nonetheless, to attract the staff in the foreseeable future from the major cities across Lithuania by offering them an appealing benefit package.

According to the head of the company Mr. Gražys, the company’s expansion through the introduction of new equipment has recently left no room for physical growth. Therefore, it is planned in the next 3 years to have a 5,000 sq m warehouse built for raw materials and a centralised raw material feeding system introduced to help ensure an even greater number of orders and a chance of securing a position in new markets.

The international project UPSKILL, coordinated by LINPRA, has completed an important stage – the piloting of the training material for plastics production line operators has been completed and the final improvements of the material has started.

The UPSKILL project focuses on the profession of plastics production line operators. Assessing the current economic and demographic trends, the lack of specialist skills and the development of the necessary competencies is a relevant challenge in many Lithuanian and European plastics industry companies, and there is a severe shortage of these specialists in the European plastics sector. The UPSKILL project aims to link European vocational training systems to the needs of the labour market and to create and implement innovative curricula for these professionals. The project pays special attention to the development of digital, robotics and other advanced manufacturing technology skills, as well as the development of environmental and entrepreneurial competencies.

The training material of the project was prepared by an international team of experts from Finland, France and Lithuania: competent representatives of educational institutions, business and the European Plastics Sector Association EuPC. The adaptation (piloting) phase of the prepared material took place during the last four months of 2020 in Lithuanian (Visaginas Vocational School and Alytus Vocational Training Center), Finnish (TREDU) and French (ISPA) vocational training institutions. Teachers and students involved in the piloting of the material learned theories based on the Teacher’s Book and Student’s Handbook, developed in the project, and tested the practical tasks both at schools and in plastics moulding companies.

Vytautas Petkūnas, the director of Visaginas Vocational School and a member of the LINPRA Board, is hoping for effective results and tangible benefits for the sector: “The UPSKILL project aims to fill an existing gap by providing training materials that do not currently exist and developing skills of future employees in the sector, which are currently missing. The pilot phase of the project was successful, and the prepared material proved to be relevant – both teachers and students actively tested it and applied the theory in practice ”.

One of the project experts, UAB Intersurgical Extrusion Process Manager Laimonas Bačkys also agrees: “I am happy to participate in the UPSKILL project and share my accumulated knowledge in the development of the training program. Thanks to a competent team of experts and coherent cooperation, we have really succeeded in developing an excellent training program for the profession of plastics production line operators. By acquiring this knowledge, future employees will be able to integrate into the activities of Lithuanian or European plastic moulding companies significantly faster, and the companies themselves will reduce the costs of employee qualification training”.

In order to fully involve students in the piloting of the project, their international virtual meetings were organized, during which they presented and demonstrated how piloting works in schools. Teachers were pleased that the students particularly enjoyed the activity and were motivated by the opportunity to see how the UPSKILL material was adapted and how students from other countries were doing.

After testing the textbooks and the curriculum, the project participants prepared pilot reports and suggestions for improving the training material. Material corrections will take place in the next few months, and in May 2021, teaching material (program, teacher’s book and student’s textbook) for plastics production line operators will be available in Lithuania for the first time. The training material will be freely available to all and can be used both in vocational schools and in the factories of plastics production.

At the end of the project in April, a virtual international UPSKILL conference will be organized to present the final results. All representatives of the plastics sector are invited – European educational communities, plastics companies, future employers and employees.

BBC announced some alarming statistics, concerning the production and use of plastics material.

Marine life is facing “irreparable damage” from the millions of tonnes of plastic waste which ends up in the oceans each year, the United Nations has warned. “This is a planetary crisis… we are ruining the ecosystem of the ocean,” UN oceans chief Lisa Svensson told the BBC. But how does this happen, where is most at risk and what damage does this plastic actually do?

The article estimates and explains the real situation: Why is plastic problematic? How much plastic is here? How much plastic waste ends up in the sea? How long till they’re gone? Why is plastic so harmful to marine life?

Read MORE.