Peruvians Create New Line of Eco-Friendly Plates, Packaging Made Entirely Out of Banana Leaves

(TMU) — Across the world people rely on dinnerware, plates, and packaging made from plastic and styrofoam. These products made from petroleum derivatives are not only filled with carcinogenic elements but also can take around 500 years to dispose of. As a result, our preference for convenience has turned into a massive crisis of fossil fuel-based plastic waste contaminating rivers, oceans, and wildlife across the planet.

But as people grow increasingly sensitive to the problem of plastic waste, businesses and consumers have been hard at work seeking new, sustainable, and environmentally-sound alternatives to single-use disposable products such as plastic plates.

And what better form of packaging is there than the kind provided to us by nature itself?

With precisely that concept in mind, a pair of Peruvian entrepreneurs have created disposable plates and containers made out of banana leaves. The product, called Bio Plant, is entirely biodegradable and free of polystyrene and other carcinogenic chemicals common in other containers.

Chuwa Plant, the company producing the disposable dishes, is led by Josué Soto and Rolf Torres Lizarraga. With assistance from the Innóvate Peru Program and grants won through the Bio Challenge contest aiming to fund innovative solutions based on resources available through Peru’s bio-diverse environment, the two were able to design specialized machines including a presser, shipper, and die-cutter to produce the biodegradable dishes.

The two are working directly with banana farmers in the Peruvian Amazon region to produce the new plates, offering fair wages and technical training to allow them to turn the waste produced by banana cultivation into the basis for a new, eco-friendly business model.

Soto noted that there is no need to cut down additional banana trees or even pluck their leaves, because they break off whenever workers remove clusters of fruit from the trees, reports RPP.

The innovative product is resistant to liquids and can be used to serve foods at every temperature. Bio Plant also only takes two months to decompose—offering a bit of an advantage over plastic options that take five centuries to break down.

So far, Chuwa Plant is manufacturing roughly 50,000 dishes every month.

Bio Plant plates are already being used at traditional festivals and events across Peru, but Soto and Lizarraga have plans to expand toward supplying organic restaurants and ecological wineries in the region.

By Elias Marat | Creative Commons | TheMindUnleashed.com