BEAMINSTER'S award-winning tea and coffee company Clipper has received yet another honour for its sustainable packaging in the Soil Association's 2002 Organic Business Awards.

The awards were presented on Monday at The Royal College of Surgeons, Lincoln's Inn Fields, London.

This national award recognises Clipper's commitment to sustainable sourcing and recycling of materials, and both the aesthetic and communication value of pack design and text. Clipper has also developed several new innovations in its packaging, which it says contributes enormously to both appearance and ease of recycling.

A spokesman said: "All our packaging is recyclable or biodegradable, with pulp from sustained forests where two trees are planted for every one harvested. Only non-chlorine bleach is used in the cardboard, and no bleach in the tea bags, and the packs are printed using non-toxic food inks."

In awarding the Organic Packaging Design award to Clipper, the judges said: "Clipper's range of packaging is a fine example of what this award is all about - exceptional design, sustainable use of materials and first-class information on pack.

"Clipper has also developed no fewer than three new modes of packaging - fully recyclable foil-lined cardboard tubes for loose tea, a soft pack using metallic polyethylene that can be recycled with household aluminium waste and a neat food-service pack for 50 enveloped tea bags with an internal drawer."

Clipper has already collected several international design awards in 2002, and won a Soil Association Organic Business Award for Consumer Education in 2001.