Opportunities and challenges for the development of packaging machinery industry

　　　Whether it is food or daily necessities, even large household items require packaging. Packaging has become a trend, and the packaging machinery industry is booming. Especially for the food industry, a variety of packaging equipment is emerging. From printing and packaging to microcomputer combination scales to finished product packaging and sale. Every step of innovation brings new changes to the food packaging industry. With the increasing demands of the international community in the food packaging industry. The competition is fierce. Behind the prosperity of the packaging machinery market at home and abroad is a battle for market competition.

1 Facts about the food packaging machinery industry: domestic and foreign

As we all know, China has a large number of food machinery enterprises, small scale, and low technology content. Only about 5% of domestic food packaging machinery companies have the production capacity of a full set of packaging systems and can compete with international companies such as Japan, Germany, and Italy. Most small food companies can only rely on imported packaging machinery and equipment. According to relevant data, the number of enterprises above designated size in China's packaging machinery industry reached 296 in 2018, with total assets of 40.274 billion yuan, the output value of 46.489 billion yuan, sales revenue of 42.454 billion yuan, and profit of about 2.324 billion yuan. This shows that the domestic demand for packaging machinery is huge. However, due to the failure of domestic packaging machinery technology to meet the needs of food companies, the import volume of domestic packaging machinery and equipment has continued to increase.

The development status of China's packaging machinery is: on the basis of introduction, digestion, and absorption, there have been certain innovations. The technological content of products is also constantly improving. These packaging machinery products are developing towards the combination of electromechanics, the combination of main and auxiliary machines, and complete wiring. There are some problems in the development of packaging machinery products in China. Mainly how to face the competition of foreign enterprises and foreign-funded enterprises, how to improve the “three transformations” level of products according to China ’s national conditions, achieve high-speed work, diversified packaging product specifications, improve reliability and how to achieve Sterilization. Under the premise of improving the performance and reliability of packaging machinery products. Towards electromechanicalization and computerized control. Use advanced methods such as reliability design, optimization design, and computer-aided design. Develop advanced machinery and components (parts) such as modular and modular to improve the technological level and "three-level" level of products. At the same time combined with the international quality system. Vigorously develop all kinds of automatic detection technology and equipment supporting packaging machinery. At present, compared with advanced developed countries, China still has gaps in some processing technologies and components, and some key materials still cannot meet the requirements. Therefore, these should be the key breakthroughs and solutions in the field of packaging machinery in China's problem.

Europe and the United States have also used their strong economic and technological advantages to cause huge pressure on China's food packaging machinery enterprises. For example, Wels' Dairy in Lemas, Iowa, USA is a dairy company with a high degree of automation. It cooperates with Kuka Robotics to develop a pallet that can maintain reliable operation in extreme cold robots. This robot can greatly guarantee the quality of the product and the speed of packaging. In the packaging machinery industry, it can be regarded as a unique new technology, and it is also a weapon for the company to realize its globalization strategy.

2 Prospects of the food packaging machinery industry: opportunities and challenges

The food machinery industry is a sunrise industry. It contains a huge potential for development. China is known as a large-scale "factory" for food processing in the future. According to relevant data, China currently produces 1.2 million tons of canned fruits annually, and about 600,000 tons are exported abroad. About one-sixth of the global market. In addition to rigid social needs. The Chinese government will take corresponding encouragement measures and will vigorously promote the transformation of food machinery enterprises towards industrialization, informationization, and marketization. Help enterprises overcome the difficulties of capital and technology.

The market size of China's packaging machinery industry in 2018 was approximately 39.371 billion yuan, an increase of 4.52% over the 37.67 billion yuan in 2017. The well-known international survey agency Visiongain also boldly predicted that the global food packaging market will reach the US $ 305.9 billion in 2019 through the survey of the development trends and trajectories of major global food packaging and beverage companies, while the Asia-Pacific market is expected to be within the forecast period. The highest growth rate. And predict that in the next 10 years, packaging machinery will undergo revolutionary changes, which will bring new opportunities for the food and beverage packaging industry.

The road of packaging machinery development is not smooth, it will face greater challenges. In China, the food industry is more scattered and there are more small workshops. According to statistics, there are 450,000 food production enterprises in China. 80% of them are produced in small workshops with less than 10 people. Because of the small size of the enterprise, there is a shortage of funds. Mechanized production is difficult to be applied, which has a certain impediment to the development of food machinery in China.

The packaging machinery industry will have a longer period of development in China. Many packaging companies are targeting foreign countries, but foreign market competition is more intense. Germany, Italy, and Japan have formed the 'iron triangle' of the packaging machinery industry. Their technical level has an overwhelming advantage for Chinese packaging machinery companies. There are only a handful of Chinese companies that can stand on the international stage. Guangdong Kenwei Intellectualized Machinery Co., Ltd. is one of the excellent global combination scale and packaging equipment manufacturing enterprises, and its products are exported to more than 90 countries and regions around the world. Relevant experts said: The development path of Chinese packaging machinery enterprises is still very long A long road will inevitably encounter various challenges. It is necessary to rely on the support of the government and actively learn advanced foreign experience while strengthening independent research and development to make progress.

3 The way out of food packaging machinery industry: technology and energy saving

Science and technology are the life and driving force of an enterprise. The automatic control system of packaging machinery has been continuously improved, making its development trend towards intelligence. If the detection technology is improved, it can not only display the current fault location of the machine but also predict the possible faults, allowing the operator to check and replace related accessories in time to effectively avoid the occurrence of faults. Remote monitoring is also an innovative application of food packaging machinery. Group customers can unify the operation of all machines and realize remote monitoring, which is a great convenience for enterprises.

In addition to the machine itself, technological innovations in the packaging machinery industry must also consider packaging materials. Environmental protection and energy saving is an important issue in the packaging industry. Many countries and social organizations have joined in the development of packaging energy saving and environmental protection technology. There are also some new environmentally friendly packaging products. For example, the United Kingdom has developed a packaging paper made of carrots, which can be used for food and food packaging; a research institute in Japan uses okara as the raw material to make an edible packaging paper that is soluble in heat.

Packaging machinery is also excellent in saving labor and material costs. It can shorten a production team of about 20 to 25 people to four to five people and can be higher than the manual production efficiency at the same time.

It can be seen that science and technology and energy conservation will become an important direction for the development of the packaging machinery industry in the future.

4 Mechatronics trends in the development of packaging machinery

With the continuous development of science and technology and technological progress, the emergence of various processed foods has put forward new requirements for food packaging technology and equipment. Packaging machinery is playing an increasing role in the field of circulation. At present, food packaging machinery competition is becoming increasingly fierce. The future food packaging machinery will cooperate with industrial automation to promote the overall level of packaging equipment. Develop multi-functional, high-efficiency, low-consumption food packaging equipment. In the current era of ever-changing science and technology. The emergence of various new technologies, new processes, new materials, and new equipment. It is no longer just the development of a certain discipline. It is the result of the mutual penetration and complementarity of various related disciplines and various advanced technologies.

Mechatronics technology is the introduction of microcomputer technology into packaging machinery. Apply mechatronics technology to develop intelligent packaging technology. According to the requirements of product automatic packaging technology, it is combined into a fully automatic packaging system for production. The detection and control of the production process and the diagnosis and elimination of faults will be fully automated, achieving high speed, high quality, low consumption, and safe production.

With the increase in food processing technology. The requirements for packaging parameters are increasing. The original control system has been difficult to meet the development of new forms. The mechanical and electronic equipment that integrates machinery, electricity, gas, light, life, electricity, and magnetism into food packaging machinery. During the design, we focused on improving the degree of automation of packaging machinery, combining the research and development of packaging machinery with computers. It can achieve mechatronics control. A complete mechatronics system generally includes microcomputers, sensors, power sources, transmission systems, actuators, and other parts. It abandons the tedious and unreasonable parts of conventional packaging machinery and integrates advanced technologies of machinery, microcomputers, microelectronics, sensors, and other disciplines into one, which brings profoundness to the design, manufacture, and control of packaging machinery. The change. Fundamentally changed the status quo of packaging machinery.

5 general development trend of packaging machinery

(1) Supporting: Only pay attention to the production of the main engine, without considering the completeness of the supporting equipment. The function of the packaging machinery applications will not be able to play out. Therefore, the development of supporting equipment to maximize the expansion of the function of the host is a crucial factor to improve the market competitiveness and economy of the equipment.

(2) Simple and convenient: In the future, packaging machinery must have multiple functions and simple adjustment and operation. Computer-based intelligent instruments will become a new trend in food packaging controllers. Structural design and structural motion control are related to the performance of packaging machinery. It can be completed by high-precision controllers such as motors, encoders, digital control (NC), and dynamic load control (PLC). Future packaging market. Efficient customer service and mechanical maintenance will be one of the most important competitive conditions.

(3) High automation: In the future, the packaging machinery industry will cooperate with industrial automation trends, and technological development will develop in four directions. That is the diversification of mechanical functions, standardization, and modularization of structural design, intelligent control, and high-precision structure.

(4) High productivity: Packaging machinery manufacturers are paying more and more attention to the development of fast and low-cost packaging equipment. The future development trend is that the equipment is smaller, more flexible, versatile, and efficient, which can save time and reduce costs. Therefore, the packaging industry is pursuing combined, concise, and mobile packaging equipment.

　(5) Adapting to the requirements of the international market, developing and designing green packaging machinery: During the design phase, it is necessary to consider packaging machinery in its full life cycle (design, manufacturing, assembly, use, maintenance. Until the post-disposal and disposal process). The environment has no or minimal impact to enhance the core competitiveness of China's packaging machinery. The design should be "green design" from the aspects of equipment structure, materials used, manufacturing process, modularity, detachability, balanced life, ergonomics, usability, and so on.

(6) Enterprises are developing towards specialization and scale: China's food packaging machinery must take the path of specialized production. By simple repetition. The method of expanding the production quantity will not work, and middle and high-end equipment must be developed. Efforts to improve technical content, make products refined, specialized, and strong.