MANILA, Philippines – D&L Industries, a food and plastic input manufacturer, has launched a new product in partnership with Japanese firm Showa Denko as an alternative to the conventional plastic bag.
The new product is the Bionolle Starcla, an environmentally-friendly bag made from 100% plant-based materials, said Alvin Lao, chief financial officer of D&L Industries.
“We are very excited about this because of the worldwide initiative to ban plastics from all kind of uses, this is seen as a viable alternative,” Lao told ANC on Thursday.
Bionolle Starcla is a starch-based biopolymer that can be used as garbage and shopping bags that fully decomposes in three months.
“Put it in the ground, put it in water, and it will literally dissolve with no residue left in three months,” said Lao.
Currently, D&L Industries is shipping the product to Japan to be used in agriculture.
“We have started shipping this to Japan in small quantities, being used mostly in agriculture. The idea is to use this film to cover plants and when the planting is done, and instead of retrieving all the film, the farmers can just plow this into the ground,” Lao said.
The firm is also in talks with several companies in Italy, a country which Lao said “desires to be at the forefront of technologies like this.”
Lao noted that they have yet to release the product in the Philippine market, saying that doing so may take more time.
“We need to educate the market and convince them that this is not the same as the plastic bag that we are used to, and that there is sustainable reason for products like this,” he said.
The partnership between D&L and Showa Denko to manufacture Bionolle Starcla was announced in January this year.
In its website, D&L described the Bionolle Starcla as an environmentally friendly compound positioned as an alternative to non-biodegradable plastic used for bags.
source: www.abs-cbnnews.com
