Amcor donate packaging for one million ORS/Zinc co-packs

Amcor, our scale-up packaging partner, has donated the packaging for a further 1 million ORS/Zinc co-packs. These will be used by Pharmanova in Zambia to assemble ORS/Zinc co-packs for the government – branded as the GRZ ORS/Zinc co-pack – and for the private sector – branded as Kit Yamoyo. The shipment will leave London on 2-Oct-20 with an estimated time of arrival in Lusaka of 18-Nov-20.

GRZ co-pack ex AmcorKit Yamoyo flexi-pack ex Amcor
GRZ ORS/Zinc co-pack and Kit Yamoyo – note that both use the same packaging with the branding carried on the instruction leaflet

To date, Amcor have donated all the packaging used to produce the ‘flexi-pack’ formats of the product and this is recognised by a tiny line of text and logo inside the bottom gusset. The generous Amcor donations have had the direct effect of reducing the cost of production of this essential treatment in a market where affordability is crucial.

Flexi-pack - donated by Amcor

In Nov-15 the flexi-pack developed by Amcor won the ‘Resource Efficient Pack of the Year’ category at the UK Packaging Awards. The two minute video below describes the inspiration for ColaLife’s work and explains how the flexi-pack works. In particular how such a simple pack is used to measure the amount of water needed to mix the ORS. Since this video was made more than a million more flexi-packs have left Pharmanova’s factory in Lusaka equating to an estimated 1,000 young lives saved.


View on YoTube

Since the award, the packaging design has been further enhanced: the top gusset has been removed. The pack now has a simple tear-off top. This reduces the material required to make the pack and makes it easier to use.

Our relationship with Amcor was brokered by our packaging design partners, PIGlobal, in mid-2013 when the ColaLife trial started to indicate that piggy-backing on the Coca-Cola system was not necessary and that we would need to redesign the Kit Yamoyo packaging.

We are very grateful for Amcor’s on-going support.