quality, sustainability and affordability will be the focus for generic and specific aspects of packaging industry, according to dr raghunath mashelkar, former directorgeneral of the council of scientific & industrial research csir. this observation was made by the ace scientist recently while delivering the keynote speech at the unveiling of a new logo of the indian institute of packaging iip.the logo has been designed by national institute of design nid, ahmedabad. the institute was celebrating its golden jubilee and the celebrations were inaugurated by ch vidyasagar rao, governor of maharashtra.&ldquoi congratulate the indian institute of packaging on this joyous occasion of its golden jubilee and wish it continued success in its future endeavours,&rdquo stated the governor, who urged the institute to work closely with traditional universities and create awareness.speaking on the occasion, mashelkar informed that the indian packaging industry was poised for tremendous growth ahead. he stated, &ldquocurrently, it comprised us27 billion and us500 bn globally. therefore good packaging is becoming an important tool for the wellbeing and safety of society.&rdquomashelkar added, &ldquoindia is not only the world&39s largest and independent democracy, but also an emerging economic giant. as india&39s economy continues to grow from strength to strength, the packaging sector will offer great opportunities and challenges for tomorrow.&rdquoelaborating further, he mentioned that a balance of quality, sustainability and affordability of packaging would require not just incremental, but also disruptive innovation considering the huge scales involved in the packaging industry.according to mashelkar, indian packaging industry had less than five per cent share of the world&rsquos 550 billion packaging industry&rsquos share. he stressed that there was enormous potential for growth with regard to intelligent packing, active packing, and functional diagnostic packing, which were part of smart packaging, in the future. he added that smart packaging, was the future of the industry as today&39s packaging embraced direct communication with consumers along with innovation.in this regard, price performance was going to be critical in india, he said and added that achieving affordability was important in such a context and it could be achieved only through safety concerns. it requires an organised effort to make hightech available to the poor, which is a challenge. dr mashelkar then informed that &39access equality&39 was important as rest of the world was already catching up with that.the event was attended by more than 1,000 participants comprising industry members, students, iip alumni members, academicians, employees, and policy makers.other members such as rajani ranjan rashmi, additional secretary, ministry of commerce and industry a b ajmera, founder member of iip and r v s ramakrishna, chairman, iip were also present. 
