In response to the serious environmental pollution caused by plastic bags, Kenya has banned the use of plastic bags since August last year. The production, sale or use of plastic bags in Kenya will face imprisonment for 1 to 4 years or up to 4 million shillings. A fine of (about RMB 260,000), citizens holding plastic bags may be arrested by the police. Although the introduction of the plastic ban has reduced the convenience of local residents who use free plastic bags for a long time, they have broken plastic production and sales. The company's way of life has brought Kenyan farmers an unexpected business opportunity to replace packaging products - sisal planting.
Sisal is native to Mexico and is grown mainly in Africa, Latin America, Asia, etc. It is the hardest fiber in the world with the largest amount and the widest range. The sisal hard leaf fiber can be used to make bags, instead of being Disabling plastic bags. According to a report released by the Global Natural Fibers Corporation on April 30 this year, Kenya exported a total of 2.014 million tons of sisal in 2017, compared with 2.12.5 million tons in the previous year. 60% of Kenyan sisal is exported to Saudi Arabia. Nigeria and China. Kenya is the world's third largest sisal producer after Brazil and Tanzania, with an annual output of around 23,000 tons.
After the new law on plastic ban came into effect, many supermarkets in Kenya began to replace plastic bags with cloth bags, which prompted a surge in demand for plant fibers such as sisal. A farmer in the southern town of Kibwez, Kenya, said that in the past, sisal per kilogram The price is only 30 Kenyan shillings, but after the government imposed a plastic ban, its price soared to 100 Kenyan shillings per kilogram. He said that he used to grow a large number of cowpeas and sorghum, and now he has grown a lot of sisal. There are even some buyers who come directly to my field to buy.'
Despite the large production, the yield level of Kenyan sisal has been lower than the world average (currently about 850 kg per hectare, while Kenya is less than 800 kg). Compared with China with a yield of 5,000 kg per hectare, it is even worse. Large. Due to the huge difference in production efficiency, and since the 1990s, China has become the world's largest importer of sisal fiber. It is urgent to cross the middlemen to control the cost of raw materials. More and more Chinese companies have entered Kenya. Combining China's planting technology with Kenya's rich land resources and cheap labor, it has gradually formed a production pattern of 'big capital, big machine, big plantation'. According to Kenya's "National Daily", a sisal enterprise plan from southern China A large sum of money was invested in Embu County, Kenya, which eventually resulted in a capacity of about 70,000 tons of sisal per hectare. Currently, the project is at a critical stage in the negotiation of land leases.
In the 1960s and 1980s, an Indian company had tried similarly in Kenya. However, during the large-scale land acquisition process, it failed to deal with the relationship between Kenyan local communities and individual farmers. Closed in the mid-1980s. Kenya's current land is divided into state-owned land, community land and private land. The agricultural land needed for planting sisal is generally community land, and transactions involving such land generally require family and community consent. The current policy stipulates that only ordinary people (including foreigners and nationals) can purchase only private land, and Chinese enterprises that produce sisal can lease land for a long time.
In Kenya, in addition to the risk of land lease, another major uncertainty comes from sisal itself. There is a long-standing competitive relationship between manufacturers of sisal fiber and synthetic fiber, and synthetic fibers often receive restrictive trade. Support for policies and subsidies. In the 1970s, the annual production of sisal and ash sisal fiber in the world was about 750,000 tons. After that, due to the advent of chemical fiber products replacing natural fiber products, the world sisal fiber production continued to decline, to 1999. In the year, the annual output dropped sharply to 261,000 tons.
In addition, although the bags made of sisal fiber are more environmentally friendly, they are more expensive than plastic bags. The UNEP head of Africa, Biot, said that the cost of such bags is more expensive than plastic bags. For the poor, this undoubtedly increases the burden of life.