Geetanjali Krishna: Dung ho about paper

PEOPLE LIKE THEM

Isn't it wonderful?" said my paper exporter friend looking fondly at a sheet of handmade paper, "this paper is a result of a double recycling process!"

I hadn't a clue what she meant, so I picked up the paper to see what was so special about it. It was a nondescript earthy brown in colour, thick and liberally sprinkled with golden straw-like fibre.

I inhaled a faintly familiar aroma emanating from it, and asked, "what fibre have you used in this paper? It's really interesting."

She replied, "I don't know what the elephant ate that night we collected his dung, but from the looks of it, it's just straw!"

Did she mean to tell me that this paper, this very ordinary-looking paper I was holding, contained elephant dung? I asked incredulously. "Yes," she said proudly, "you're holding hundred-percent dung paper!"

Why on earth would anybody want to make paper out of elephant poo? I asked.

"Well, it's been done elsewhere, though this sheet is the first of it's kind in India," said she, "the Sri Lankans have apparently been selling dung paper for a while now. You see, there's a great sense of satisfaction gained from creating something worthwhile and saleable from waste "" and what epitomises waste better than dung?"

And then there was the argument that this paper, along with other recycled varieties, was more eco-friendly compared to mill made paper, normally made from wood pulp.

"Why elephant dung?" I asked. "Because," she explained patiently, "elephants eat a lot of fibre in straw, and excrete most of it undigested. We wash the dung with water and disinfectant, and when it's dried it in the sun, it's a lot like the fibre we normally use to make hand made paper."

So all they needed to do was to beat the fibre in the pulp beaters (little like food processors, from the sounds of it), and lift the watery pulp on flat sieves, to dry into reams of paper.

Her plans for dung paper included some benefits for the producers of the dung "" the elephants.

"Currently, we're sourcing the dung from an elephant colony near Amber, in Jaipur. Once this paper goes into production, we plan to give the elephant owners fodder for the animals, in return for dung," said she.

Can the dung of other animals also be used to make paper, I asked, thinking hopefully that this might help mitigate our solid waste disposal problems.

"Only that of some grass eaters," she said. "Carnivores barely excrete fibre. And camels, even though they are grass eaters, chew their cud so long that their dung is useless for us!"

In fact, part of her r&d agenda is to create paper out of what she calls 'mixed dung', ie, dung of elephants, buffaloes, cows and goats.

What market did she think this paper had, I asked. "Oh, it's really versatile "" I just used it in my computer printer, and the paper proved to be great for printing because it didn't smudge at all.

Its been thoroughly disinfected, both by chemicals and by sunlight, and there's no danger of getting any germs through it!" It's also cheaper to produce than regular handmade paper, an added bonus.

Abroad, she said, there was a definite market for niche paper products, where the dung paper would nicely fit.

I left my friend to her odiferous r&d, thinking of those pachyderms, endlessly slaving up and down the the hilltop Amber Fort in Jaipur with goggle-eyed tourists on their backs. Thanks to her, their dung had come a longer way than they ever would.