Making bio-based resins for packaging with tomato peels

Melina Gerdts
Apr 10
3 min read

Tommaso Barbieri, COO of Tomapaint on making the italian tomato industry more circular and developing bio-based resins that will change the food packaging industry.

Tomatoes sliced infront of a red background — Image by Rachel Kelli on Unsplash.

Ever look at a can of tomatoes and wonder what happened to the peel? Probably not. But that’s exactly the kind of waste we should be thinking about. Why? Because the tomato processing industry in Italy alone generates about 150,000 tons of tomato waste each year. A massive, mostly untapped resource.

And while many big players like Mutti already send a lot of that waste off for compost or biogas, one innovative Italian startup looked at a tomato peel and saw potential.

Based in the heart of Italy’s tomato country, Parma, the italian Start-up TomaPaint is turning leftover tomato skins into bio-based resins used in food packaging, cosmetics, textiles, and even golf courses. We spoke with co-founder and COO Tommaso Barbieri about what it means to give waste a second life, and how TomaPaint is challenging the fossil-fueled status quo.

A Forgotten Patent - bio-based resins for a fascist regime

TomaPaint’s story starts with an old 1930s Italian patent. Back then, during Mussolini’s autarkic push for self-sufficiency, researchers experimented with using tomato byproducts to make resins. Decades later, food packaging expert Angela Montanari stumbled across that old idea and realized it was time to give it a 21st-century circular twist.

Together with her son Tommaso Barbieri and two brothers who run a biogas plant, the team built TomaPaint as a family-run startup dedicated to revalorizing tomato waste.

Their core product? Cutin, a hydrophobic bioresin extracted from tomato peels, which can replace synthetic coatings in everything from canned foods to compostable textiles.

Why Cutin is the Coating of the Future

Let’s talk chemistry for a second. The coatings currently used in metal food packaging are mostly petrochemical-based and often contain substances like BPA or PFAS, which are increasingly coming under fire for their environmental and health risks.

TomaPaint’s cutin-based bioresin changes the game. It's:

Bio-based
Non-toxic
Hydrophobic by nature
And surprisingly versatile

So far, it's being used in:

Metal and paper food packaging
Water-resistant golf course treatments
Cosmetics
Textile coatings

And the list keeps growing.

A Value Chain Rooted in Sustainability

Operating in Parma, where more than 50% of Italy’s tomatoes are processed, TomaPaint is surrounded by the tomato supply chain. They collect tomato waste directly from food producers like Mutti, extract the cutin, and supply it to chemical companies formulating coatings. But it doesn’t stop there.

Once they’re done extracting cutin, the “exhausted peels” are sent to biogas plants, making the material easier to digest and improving energy yields. And here's another circular twist: TomaPaint uses the energy from those same biogas plants to power its own operations.

A true closed-loop in action.

Scaling the Peel-Based Revolution

Right now, TomaPaint’s facility has a 500-ton capacity, but they’re just getting started. They aim to scale up across Europe, setting up plants near major tomato processing hubs.

But scaling up isn’t cheap. Despite early funding from the EU's Horizon program and Italian accelerators, TomaPaint is actively seeking investment to expand production and explore new byproduct applications, like extracting oil from tomato seeds for biofuel, or using fiber-rich exhausted peels as bioplastic fillers.

So What’s the Impact?

For every kilo of cutin produced, TomaPaint saves 5 kg of CO₂compared to fossil-based resins. At scale, that’s the equivalent of planting 200,000 trees across an area the size of Central Park.

Add in the elimination of toxic ingredients and the increased demand for sustainable alternatives driven by EU regulation and consumer pressure, and you’ve got a pretty compelling case for ditching the petro-based status quo.

Main Takeaways

Tomato waste isn’t waste—it’s a raw material for high-value bioresins.
TomaPaint’s cutin replaces synthetic coatings with a safer, more sustainable alternative.
The startup closes the loop by sending processed peels to biogas and using that energy to power production.
Their tech is scalable and applicable across industries: packaging, cosmetics, textiles, even agriculture.
With the right investment, TomaPaint could become a cornerstone of Europe’s green transition.