Sustainability through Vegetation and Organic Resources Conversion – I

An average Plant, in its "green" condition, could be mechanically separated into the following (by Weight):

1. Cellulosic/ Fibrous portion …............ about 7.5% to 20%
2. Non-cellulosic Organic portion …....... about 3% to 15%
3. Water …......................................... about 65% to 90% (Although a small percentage of Inorganic matter are present, we shall ignore the same for our present study)

(these are not sacrosanct, and could be still different)

We need to recognize that plants/ green vegetation (whether artificially grown through agriculture or naturally grown) form the greatest volumes of Renewable Resources in the world. And, as these are "fixed" by sunlight, through a complex bio-chemical process (yet to be universally understood, fully), we may observe that the rate of growth of plants (hereafter, reference to plants would mean any green vegetation) would be directly proportional to the incident sunlight in a region. Off-course, CO₂ and H₂O are the main material ingredients that initiate the bio-chemical processes, leading to plant formation. Look at the following plant growth (weights are "green" weights, inclusive of water content) and other data presented:

This is a village farm in Southern India, where Coconut Trees are cultivated for two purposes: One is to supply "tender" coconut to the National Highway Road travelers, whose appetite for this natural drink is very high; the other is for the regular "vegetables market" where coconuts are bought by households, for their food preparations. This region does not have good "oil bearing" nuts; yet the businesses generated, though not highly rewarding, offers some income for the farmers. The farm would also grow the following: Dry regional Palm, which bears special "fruits' having natural sugar content (local farmers extract palm sugar and also ferment local Palm alcohol). Palm sugar is nutritious and does not have the "bad effects" of refined cane sugar (even diabetics could use palm sugar); Banana; Special fodder grasses, vegetables; tamarind and local fruits/ papaya.

NATURAL FIBER POLYMER COMPOSITE (NFPC) MOLDED STRAND BOARDS

USING COCONUT LEAF SPLINTERS – A SUSTAINABLE USAGE

BANANA PLANTATION WITH PARTHENIUM WEEDS

DRIED BANANA STEM FIBERS

SISAL PLANTS GROW AS HEDGE ROW VEGETATION

These "wild plants also give us strong fibers, more or less like the Banana fibers. All these fibers could be converted into high-strength and high-value NFPC products, which have very good market potentials

HIGH QUALITY UTILITARIAN PRODUCTS

MADE OF VARIOUS FIBERS

Hitherto, the farm community has had to depend purely on "cash" crops, which provide both food values locally, as well as income through sale of excess crops produced. However, over the years, the farm community has noticed that intensive (so-called scientific) farming with various artificial fertilizers, pesticides and other "modern" inputs has resulted in soil deterioration; the resistance to diseases has reduced; and various new viruses/ pests attack the farm vegetation systems. Costs of input (including those of electricity, and labor) have increased multi-fold, but the yield as well as remunerations have not been commensurate. Many farmers have resorted to the extreme step of suicide (From 1991-92, when the first Globalization phenomenon began in India, over 150, 000 farmer suicides are on record). The result: many farmers have sold their meager lands (about 80% of Indian farmers have less than 3 ha land holdings) to builders and Industries, and both labor and farm community have now migrated to big cities, in search of better livelihood – taking with them their problems and creating many new problems due to dislocation, ethnicity, non availability of housing, non availability of sanitation...etc.

OUR OBJECTIVES

These are the very problems (the problems of livelihood benefits of the poorest farm and labor community, most of whom either continue to live or have fled from the 635, 000 dilapidated villages) that Agro-Biogenics would attempt to mitigate, apart from answering the problems due to Global Warming. Once we arrive at Sustainable Systems in the Indian context, we shall extrapolate these to over 135 tropical nations world wide. Many of these are well defined in our Websites:

http://www.agro-biogenics.com/Index.htm

http://www.agro-biogenics.com/Home.htm

http://www.agro-biogenics.com/apix.html

The biggest problem arising out of the current farm-troubles is Shifting Population; the villagers migrating en-masse' to bigger cities; educated youngsters moving out of the nation to alien lands. Both these have resulted in personal problems to the migrants and social/ ethnic problems for the government. Many of these have now come up in various back-lashes: Various immigrant communities being attacked in far away lands; and at home, migrant laborers/ workers being attacked by ethnic differences and local "job losses"

SOLUTION THROUGH SUSTAINABILITY PROGRAMS – Engineering Materials

We believe that solutions to these would also solve the Global Warming problems, if we look at Plant Resources as the appropriate choice for Energy and Engineering materials. Such a plan of attack would be Sustainable in view of the renewable nature of the Plants.. In this part (SUSTAINABILITY THROUGH VEGETATION AND ORGANIC RESOURCES CONVERSION – I), we shall look at the potential to convert Plant resources into Engineering materials. The plant resources would be used to manufacture Wood Substitutes, Metal Replacements, Modular Designs and various other engineered systems. A few examples have been presented, based on the works undertaken by this writer. CR4 Members are invited to come forward with their experiences, ideas and suggestions for New Innovative processes leading to useful Engineering materials.

Thank you

Hari