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The world is big, there are no wonders.
Can you think of it? The coconut shells that we usually throw away 100% after eating have been bought by India and become an economic industry that benefits one party.
The stinking and rotten mango was bought home by the small European country of the Netherlands and turned into a treasure.
What's even more exaggerated is that even the spiky and smelly durian shell can shine in Singapore.
These countries import so much of what we think of as garbage, what do you want?
Are cultural differences large enough to transcend physiological needs?
In fact, it is not a matter of cultural differences, but there are many articles in it, and after reading the third article, it will definitely help you.
Universal coconut shell
I believe that everyone is certainly no stranger to coconuts, round and rolling, both cute and delicious.
Imagine lying under an umbrella with sunglasses in the heat, holding half a coconut fruit that you had just drunk coconut juice in one hand and digging up jelly-like coconut meat with a metal spoon in the other.
After eating, the remaining coconut shells are placed on the small table next to it, and after a while, a cleaning staff will take a large garbage bag to clean it up, so as not to affect your leisurely mood on vacation.
But if it were in India, it wouldn't happen.
Because for Indians, coconut water can not be drunk, coconut meat can not be eaten, but coconut shells, absolutely can not be thrown away.
India's coconut production is also a number one in the world, and for every five coconuts produced in the world, India will contribute one.
But strangely enough, india's name is not seen in the world's coconut export rankings.
You know, India is the world's third largest coconut producer, producing more than 10 million tons of mature coconuts every year, second only to the Philippines, which regards coconuts as a major industry, and Indonesia, which is sparsely populated.
But if you look at exports alone, India's coconut exports are even worse than those of a small country like Sri Lanka.
The question is, where did the coconuts in India go? Produced and sold?
India is a country with a population of more than 1.3 billion people, if the whole country really likes to eat coconuts, more than 10 million tons a year is indeed not enough for them to eat, but is this the case?
According to statistics, it was found that only a quarter of the coconuts produced in India became crops for their own national consumption, while the other three-quarters were used in other places, even in industry.
Yes, I am not wrong, the coconuts produced by Indians are indeed used in industry.
Moreover, in those coconuts that are grown for industrial use, except for a small number of relatively high-quality coconut water that will be made into coconut milk drinks, ninety percent of the coconut water and coconut meat are thrown away.
They only need coconut shells.
Is it worth it?
After reading the following, I believe that everyone will have a clearer understanding of coconut shells.
As everyone must know, the shell of an untreated ordinary coconut is wrapped in a layer of hay-like substance, that is, coconut shell fiber, which is extremely tough and lightweight.
Some smart people have found business opportunities here.
At first, when the Indian masses had not yet discovered the role of coconut shells, the treatment was the same as on the mainland, and the finished coconuts were thrown away as garbage, which cheapened the original smart people.
They separated the coconut shells and fibers they collected at zero cost, and the coconut shells were directly crushed into puree by the machine and sold to farmers for fertilization.
The real money is the fiber, these fibers after the soaking chemical liquid after the leaching process, not only the inherent textile resistance completely disappeared, but also became tougher, more difficult to break.
After the discovery of this coconut shell fiber, it directly replaced the position of jute and sisal in the textile world, because both in terms of toughness and lightness, coconut hemp can play a parity between them.
But in terms of cost, the acquisition and production cost of coconut shell fiber is too low.
With the promotion of coir fiber, more and more products made of coconut shell fiber have gradually appeared on the market.
For example, mattresses, carpets, coarse cloth, hemp rope, etc., coconut shell fiber is inconspicuous in the perception of Indians, but it has long been deeply rooted in their lives.
In addition to being directly broken into fertilizer and made into coconut hemp fiber, coconut shells are often used by Indians for crafts because of their excellent hardness.
Lightshades, tableware, musical instruments and other gadgets can be made of coconut shells, which can be described as numerous.
As long as it is made of wood, coconut shells can be made to some extent, and the texture is harder.
But the real consumption of coconut shells, in fact, is not the above three, the next we want to talk about this function, is to make India, the world's top three countries in coconut production, no coconut can be exported.
Coconut shells can be used as high-quality activated charcoal.
Compared with the light chemical industries such as fertilizers, hemp ropes and handicrafts, high-quality activated carbon is too important for India's industrial system.
As we mentioned earlier, India is a developing country with a population of 1.3 billion and is currently transforming from an agrarian society to an industrial society, so the industrial resources they need are much less than those on the mainland.
Coir resources, like the coal resources of the mainland, play an important role in India's industrial development.
Every kilogram of coconut shell, after carbon pyrolysis, can still retain three hundred grams of coconut shell charcoal, and three-tenths of the available carbon retention rate makes coconut shell a major boost to India's carbon resources.
In this case, not to mention the coconuts produced by India itself, even the coconut shells that are not many in other countries cannot escape the fate of Barbie Q in India.
According to statistics, more than 90% of the world's coconut shells have been packed home by India and have become regular customers of the boiler room.
So why don't other countries use coconut shells as an industrial resource?
In fact, Sri Lanka, which is also a big coconut producer, also uses coconut shells like India, but other countries can't do it.
Because if there are not enough local coconuts, coconut shell carbon is not an affordable carbon resource.
Ocean transportation coupled with industrial properties makes the cost of importing coir even more than coal, and it is necessary to build a complete set of industrial facilities suitable for coir charcoal, no matter how you think about it, it is more cost-effective to use coal.
But then again, Indians have indeed used coconut shells in place, and it is estimated that the coconut shells that have been thrown into the trash can in our country can not imagine that their cousins have such treatment in India.
Stinky mango brand leather
After talking about the cute coconut shells, let's talk about mangoes, which are also tropical fruits.
Mainly talk about stinky mangoes.
It is the Netherlands, which is eight thousand kilometers away from us, and the people of this country especially like rotten mangoes, and good people are not rare, they are rare and bad, whether they are smelly or long and bad, as long as they are rotten mangoes, I want them.
Is it just as they love to eat canned herring, the Dutch also like to eat spoiled mangoes?
It's not that they have strange fetishes, it's that they can turn worthless stinky mangoes into valuable leather.
Yes, can mangoes turn into leather? Let's talk a little bit.
Mango is known as the king of tropical fruits because of its multivitamin content and its super high proportion.
After the mainland's economic level is getting better and better, mango imports are also rising year by year, because we don't actually grow too many mangoes ourselves.
By 18 years, the mainland, along with LaoMei and the Netherlands, had become the top three importers of mangoes.
Mainland China and the United States, that is naturally love to eat, after all, the nutritional value of mango is indeed high, the taste and flavor are also very distinctive.
But the Netherlands, which is also in the top three, seems to be out of place with us.
Why? Because the Netherlands specializes in picking smelly and rotten mangoes to buy.
I believe that everyone who often eats mangoes knows that mangoes, as a tropical fruit with extremely high water content, have a very fast deterioration rate.
Fresh raw mango with skin is not recommended to be stored for more than seven days in the refrigerator refrigerator, and in the summer outside the refrigerator, it is not recommended to store for more than three days, otherwise it is not only the loss of flavor, but also the nutrients contained in it will be greatly reduced, and there is a possibility of deterioration.
Once the mango is spoiled, brown spots will appear on the skin, the whole fruit will become very soft, and the pulp inside will begin to stink.
I believe that people who have smelled stinky mango will remember the smell particularly deeply.
In our cognition, fruits, especially tropical fruits, once spoiled, it is impossible to eat, because the spoiled pulp contains carcinogens, on the one hand, it is directly thrown away, and even pets will not be fed.
Therefore, even those of us who eat mangoes at home are prone to spoiled mangoes, and those bulk mango exporters are even more worried about this.
Sometimes there is a random gust of wind on the sea, or a random stay at the import customs of other countries, and a large number of mangoes will face the danger of deterioration.
And they not only have to worry about spoilage, but also squeeze deformation or damage is also a major reason for the loss of mangoes.
In the past, broken or damaged mangoes could not be sold, so they had to be disposed of as garbage, and they had to pay another garbage disposal fee, and then return empty.) This is undoubtedly a huge loss for mango merchants.
But that has changed since the emergence of a company in Finland called Fruitleather, and spring has come for importers and exporters of mangoes.
The company uses eco-friendly technology to turn worthless rotten mangoes into valuable leather and sells them all over the world.
How did these two seemingly unrelated objects merge together?
First ask a question, what is the most annoying thing when everyone eats mangoes?
It is estimated that more than 90% of them particularly hate those fibrous filaments on the surface of mango cores, right? It is strong and astringent, which not only affects the taste, but also traps a lot of pulp.
Yes, it's these fibers that make stinky mangoes, which should be reduced to garbage, a cash crop that can be made of leather.
The first thing that leather manufacturers do when processing rotten mangoes is to separate the pulp from the core, and then the peel and pulp are stirred and broken together, and then multiple mechanical filtration can be carried out to separate the fibers.
After the fibers are separated, chemical additives need to be added to stir well, and finally only need to be flattened and baked dry, and a piece of waterproof and durable leather is finished.
Is the process too simple? Yes, it is as simple as that, the focus is on those industry-secret chemical additives, and no other country can use mango fiber to make leather, which is why the Netherlands imports rotten mangoes from overseas at high cost to make leather.
After the leather is completed, and then the machine embossing, carving and other processes, different colors, textures will be sold to different merchants, and the merchant's demand for artificial leather, that can only be said to be the more the better.
Is it amazing that this leather product like the picture below is made by consuming more than a hundred mangoes?
Magical durian shell
Although durian is not much cultivated on the mainland, I think everyone is familiar with it, and its ugly appearance and impressive smell can be said to be difficult for people who have seen it to forget.
But what everyone may not know is that in the mainland, durian can actually be said to be the most popular fruit for everyone.
There are data as evidence, but also from 18 years, among the imported fruits of the mainland, among which the expensive durian won the championship, the import volume ranked first.
In 2020, the mainland has become the world's first country in durian imports, and the world's exports of durian, the mainland has bought 97% of it, that is, 97% of the proportion, and the remaining 3% is left for the world to share.
Isn't that an exaggeration? Don't be modest, to receive this honor, but also to thank all the foodies here.
But today we are going to talk about the durian shell, yes, the durian shell that is left after eating the pulp, which is full of nails and can only be thrown away.
I think everyone will wonder, what can this thing do?
When weapons are used for self-defense? Even if you can't run the enemy, you can smoke away the enemy, right?
As you may know, although in our country, durian shells have nowhere to go but trash cans, but in our little neighbor Singapore, it is very useful.
Singapore's imported durian ranks second in the world, only below us, but it only sounds scary, in fact, it only accounts for less than 0.5% of the world's total imports, probably more than 10 million durians, after all, our family has bought 97% of the world's durians.
But then again, Singapore is a country, but it's actually more like a city, can they eat so much durian?
They can't eat it, but they are also similar to the Netherlands, with so many durian imports, in fact, more than half of them are bought durian shells.
In their hands, the durian shell becomes a hydrogel that can be sterilized.
Don't be surprised, under the interference of high technology, it is not impossible for a durian full of thorns to become a soft glue.
Scientists at Nanyang Polytechnic in Singapore, after three years of experimental research, extracted a rare and high-quality plant fiber from the durian skin.
That's right, fiber again. They mixed this fiber with grease, and combined with natural yeast, they were able to make the above-mentioned soft hydrogel that could be used to sterilize.
And this hydrogel combined with a small bandage made of durian shells has become a daily necessity for everyone to dissolve the Band-Aid.
The study pointed out that for every three kilograms of durian shells, fifty grams of pure fibers can be extracted, and these fifty grams of pure fibers can make two thousand decomposable Band-Aids.
This is equivalent to three kilograms of durian shells to make two thousand Band-Aids, and this Band-Aid will also decompose on its own, which is particularly environmentally friendly.
The role of durian shell fiber is not only this, it can have different functions when combined with other substances, such as transmitting bioelectric signals, and carrying close to the body can detect heartbeats.
After Singapore made this discovery, it began to vigorously attack the research and utilization of durian shell fibers, which made itself the world's second largest importer of durian shells.
Epilogue:
After reading the above three typical cases of waste utilization, I believe that everyone's heart is not without touch.
Yeah, there's no such thing as absolute garbage, only misplaced resources.
Moreover, we also have to admit that high technology does bring too much convenience to human beings, and when high technology and nature are combined, they can surpass our own gifts.