About 20 years ago, Bangladesh became the first nation on Earth to ban single-use plastic bags. Since then, plastic pollution has gotten worse. To find a biodegradable replacement, the government turned to jute, a cash crop that's grown here for centuries. Can one scientist bring more of this "golden fiber" to a country drowning in plastic?
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00:00 Across South Asia, this golden fiber called jute has been used to weave clothes, mats,
00:07 and bags for more than 2,000 years. By the 1900s, jute sacks were essential for the global
00:18 trade of nearly all crops. And the region that would later become Bangladesh was one
00:24 of the world's biggest producers. But synthetic materials replaced jute within a few decades
00:30 of the industry's peak. Now, one scientist is trying to revive interest in this swamp
00:36 plant by turning it into a biodegradable replacement for plastic. The government of Bangladesh
00:42 invested roughly $2 million into his idea, after becoming the first country in the world
00:48 to ban single-use plastic bags, a law Mubarak Ahmed Khan was against.
00:55 Twenty years after the ban, plastic trash in this country is still, well, everywhere.
01:06 So can jute offer an alternative to a world drowning in plastic? And can Bangladesh once
01:11 again become the world capital for this trade?
01:18 Every day, more than 200 tons of jute is delivered to one of the largest mills in the country.
01:23 Ahyon Jute Mills is located about four hours southwest of the capital, Dhaka. Bangladesh
01:30 exports nearly a billion dollars worth of jute each year. There's even a whole government
01:34 ministry dedicated to it. This mill has five warehouses that are emptied and restocked
01:39 within a week as the stuff is prepped for processing.
01:45 Workers start by combing the reeds over spikes to soften the fibers.
01:52 After, they throw the raw jute into a "spreader machine." It separates the strands and forms
01:59 them into large rolls that are placed back into the machine for more detangling. The
02:06 wheels are transferred here and covered with cloth for about 48 hours.
02:13 Then pin rollers soften them and remove any impurities.
02:18 The other end spews out ribbon-like strands called "slivers."
02:23 To reduce their width and thickness, they then go through a process called "drawing,"
02:27 which involves crimping the fibers to enhance their strength and flexibility until they're
02:31 ready for spinning.
02:34 These machines twist and lengthen the jute into spools. Yarn consists of one strand,
02:39 while twine is made with two.
02:41 The next step is "winding." That's when any spinning errors are corrected to improve
02:46 the yarn's performance.
02:49 Some spools are used to weave rugs and bags. Workers crank out 2 to 3 million of these
02:54 a month.
02:56 Now this mill employs about 3,000 people. But the demand for jute used to be much higher.
03:03 2018 was the mill's golden year. Every month it was exporting 4,000 metric tons of
03:10 jute. These days, it sells nearly half that amount.
03:16 This region used to be part of Bengal, in British India, and has been harvesting and
03:19 processing jute at a massive scale since the 1850s.
03:33 The crop thrives in warm and humid environments, so it's no surprise jute grows well here.
03:40 Jute basically was the plastic bag of the early 1900s, used to package and ship everything
03:45 from sugar to corn to wool.
03:49 During World War I, Europe imported over a billion jute sandbags to use in trench warfare.
03:55 The industry peaked in 1970, with around 170,000 people working with the crop.
04:00 The world's largest jute mill, the Adam Jew X, near Dhaka. Jute has always been an important
04:06 product of this area, and today this is a major industrial center.
04:13 By then, the region was part of Pakistan, and many were unhappy with the government.
04:18 The decline of jute started around the time of the Bangladesh Liberation War. Separatists
04:24 fought for and won independence in 1971. But millions of people were displaced in the bloody
04:31 war, and many jute mills were left ownerless. The newly formed country of Bangladesh took
04:37 control of most mills, which, according to some critics, led to corruption and mismanagement.
04:44 Around the same time, plastic was taking off in global markets.
04:49 And as the months go by, jute is losing more and more ground to synthetic fibers.
04:56 And in the 80s, many farmers abandoned jute for other cash crops. Nearly half of the mills
05:02 had closed by 1998. And by 2001, jute's export earnings had dropped from 90% to under 5%.
05:11 Today the demand for jute remains low, as cotton and plastic fibers are relatively cheaper.
05:18 But Mubarak hopes to restore the crop's lost glory by using it to solve Bangladesh's plastic problem.
05:24 Jute makes a good substitute because of its high concentration of cellulose, the structural
05:36 component of plant cell walls that give them strength and rigidity.
05:41 The state-run Lotif Bawani Mill has been working with Mubarak since 2016 to make these plastic-like bags.
05:48 Here, the jute comes from traders who buy it directly from farmers.
05:54 First, raw jute fibers are shredded into 4mm-sized bits.
05:59 Then, they're mixed with some secret chemicals to extract the cellulose for about 4 hours.
06:08 The leftover pieces are bleached and dried in an oven until they look like this.
06:13 Next, workers mix and modify the cellulose to make it water-soluble, and combine it with
06:19 substances called binders and crosslinkers, molecules that bond it all together.
06:25 To make the solution even more like plastic, workers load it into a heated reaction chamber for 3 hours.
06:34 Once the liquid cools, they blend it with a plant-derived polymer and natural food coloring.
06:40 Mubarak says his concoction doesn't include any waste or petroleum products.
06:47 But he wouldn't tell us every ingredient out of fear that someone might steal his invention.
06:52 The end result is poured directly into the film casting machine.
07:02 Here, the composite rotates on a steel belt and is dried with hot air until it becomes a colorful film.
07:10 Most of these machines had to be custom-built.
07:15 Workers cut the film sheets by hand and use sewing machines to stitch the material together.
07:31 The final product consists of 70% jute. It's called the "Sonali Bag," after the Bengali word for "golden."
07:38 The project is still operating on a pilot basis under his direction, and is completely funded by the Ministry of Textiles in Jute.
07:51 Today, Latif Bawani has the capacity to make 15,000 Sonali bags per day, but it doesn't always run full-scale.
07:59 The number depends on how many orders are received.
08:02 Corporate customers for the bag once included British American tobacco, electronics dealer Rahim Afroz, and fashion brands like Sara Lifestyle.
08:11 But the partnerships didn't last, since the Sonali Bag project doesn't have the production capacity to meet even a fraction of what these companies needed.
08:20 Finding the investment to scale up remains a challenge.
08:25 We need money. We need the infrastructure. We need the management.
08:29 And now we don't find any real business guy who's going to use this technology.
08:36 So how does it compare to a single-use plastic or polypropylene bag?
08:52 That's because plastic is made from oil, and jute is biodegradable.
08:56 So when it eventually decomposes, the stored carbon stays within the soil instead of being released back into the atmosphere.
09:04 So far, only the government of Bangladesh has certified that the Sonali Bag is biodegradable.
09:09 But each one is designed to dissolve within three months in soil and eight hours in water.
09:16 And it can hold roughly 35 pounds compared to a traditional plastic bag's 20-pound capacity.
09:22 The main problem is Sonali Bags cost about 10 times more than plastic ones, and about five times more than other biodegradables like paper bags.
09:31 But as Mubarak scales up production, he expects the price to drop.
09:36 These days, some stores, brands, and environmental groups buy Sonali Bags on a small scale to test their durability.
09:43 Like Sultan Mart in Chhatogram, the country's second-largest city.
09:47 Owner Sharif Ahmed says his brother bought the bags for him directly from Bangladesh Jute Mills Corporation.
09:55 He claims they don't tear as easily as plastic ones.
10:10 Some customers can hardly tell them apart from traditional plastic bags.
10:13 Mubarak understands the challenges behind shifting away from such a cheap, commonly used material like plastic.
10:38 And right now, Sonali Bags just aren't as affordable.
10:41 The government has been supportive of his initiative, but it hasn't been fully enforcing the bag ban.
10:47 Two decades after it was enacted, the average city dweller consumes three times more plastic.
10:53 Over the years, a series of natural disasters like cyclones and floods have diverted attention away from the cause.
11:02 Even though plastic waste makes the floods worse by blocking waterways.
11:07 Political instability and corruption have also disrupted progress.
11:11 Other countries have had some success with similar bans.
11:15 Kenya enacted a ban on plastic bags in 2017, and now, 80% of the public has stopped using them.
11:22 In Rwanda, authorities go as far as confiscating plastic bags from luggage as people enter the country.
11:28 Perpetrators are subject to steep fines or even jail time.
11:32 Bangladesh has its penalties too. A wide range of fines from about $450 to $9,000,
11:38 or an imprisonment of 1 to 10 years, depending on how the judge rules.
11:43 But here, businesses and individuals aren't regularly monitored for violations.
11:48 Making a viable alternative is a huge step forward.
11:52 But the country has a long way to go before Sonali Bags are more common than plastic ones.
11:58 After more than 20 years of working on this project, Mubarak still believes jute can solve the plastic problem,
12:04 not only in Bangladesh, but everywhere else too.
12:09 This is our duty, to produce the jute globally and show the variety and beauty of the jute all over the world.
12:19 [Music]