Ecopapel (Ecopaper)

to ecopapel web site

Ecopaper samples

Paper for a Better Planet

Summary
Ecopapel began 11 years ago in the coastal city of Bahía de Caráquez, Ecuador, as a means of using a waste product to create ethical, alternative employment for impoverished families affected by environmental degradation – mangrove destruction and dry tropical forest destruction. The project recycles waste paper into beautifully designed paper and cards complete with hand applied dried flowers.

The main objectives of the project are environmental protection, environmental education, and community income production. Ecopapel complements the many other activities that its founders are involved in to develop Bahía as a model Eco-city. Ecopapel provides the model for a foundation from which an ecologically responsible and socially just society can grow.

Background
Bahía de Caráquez is located at the estuary of two large rivers that join 36 km inland. This large estuary was formerly rich with mangrove forest and marine life. The communities surrounding the estuary lived in a harmonious existence with the mangrove forest that provided them with many resources until shrimp farming began 30 years ago.

Shrimp farmers easily bought rights to the mangrove areas and set up shrimp farms forcing local communities to either work as employees for the companies, or move to towns or city slums in search of work. The resources that the mangroves had provided, from food to building materials, dwindled away. Now only 200 ha of the original 4000 ha of mangrove forest remains. EcoPapel began as a response to the need of these communities to provide food, shelter, and clothing for their families now that their resource base had been destroyed.

The purposes of paper recycling include: reducing deforestation, making something useful out of a waste product, reducing contamination and garbage, avoiding burning of paper and consequent air pollution, and the development of a general culture of recycling. Families involved in the project not only learn about recycling but reusing and extending the useful life of products. The project is used as a focus in environmental education of school children and adults, demonstrating how garbage can be converted into an income generating resource.

Since its establishment in 1991, Ecopapel has also provided a replicable model for countless other community groups throughout Ecuador (15 groups directly initiated by EcoPapel). The result of which has been that of helping many people secure an alternative income, build community bonds, raise environmental awareness, and reduce environmental impact by recycling waste. In the many fair trade, and souvenir and craft outlets in Ecuador you can not only find Ecopapel products, but many other paper recycling initiatives inspired by this first exemplary model of environmental and community stewardship.

Activities
EcoPapel has set up a collection system for the paper in Bahía de Caráquez and surrounding areas. Schools, offices, banks, the city hall, and printers have been involved in this process. The collected paper is sorted and then recycled. The recycling is done manually, with the exception of using simple machines to process the pulp. The entire process is as natural as possible and involves none of the chemicals commonly used in industrial papermaking. Ecopapel uses waste paper combined with natural local fibres including banana, coconut and corn. Wherever possible local alternatives are used for binding. Two local fruits are often used for this purpose, one contains a natural glue (moyuyo), the other (cassava) contains a useful starch. Paper dyes are either a product of the original color of the recycled paper or from natural sources wherever possible.

The actual recycling is done at one workshop and then the paper is taken to a second workshop where it is transformed into 82 different creative products, from journals to folders, picture frames and business cards. Almost all of the products are decorated with dried flowers (wild and cultivated).

Out Put
Thirty-six people, mostly women, are now employed directly by Ecopapel. The production capacity is considerable; 10,000 articles can be made per month. New products are continually being created with different materials from the zone.

An innovative aspect of the paper production is that it can be both personalised and decorated with flowers according to the taste of the client or the use it will have. A traditional printing process is used which beautifully prints the paper creating a low relief effect. The paper is marketed within Ecuador in fair trade and specialty paper outlet, and internationally through the internet. This assists in ensuring that the operation is financially sustainable by not depending on only one sales outlet and by providing a wide range of different products. People from all over the world have ordered personalised wedding and birthday invitations, diplomas, clothes tags, business cards, and calendars, among other recycled paper products.

Poverty Reduction.
The initiative has provided direct employment to 36 people who, in most cases, support their entire families with this income. It has provided indirect employment to many other people, including women who make the balsa-wood packaging boxes, bamboo flowers and pens, the printer, and flower collectors.

Employees receive an above average income allowing an increase in their standard of living and quality of life. They have appreciated a secure income and good human relations which has lead to strong bonding within the workplace. Many of the women and families have been involved since the beginning and consider Ecopapel as an extended family. Many of the women have included their children in the work they do, and the children now help their parents at home. This provides additional help for the family economy and passes on work skills to future generations.

Many of the women work in their houses and are able to work at their own pace, and with their choice of products. Every few months training is given in an area sometimes related to work and sometimes related to health, diet and crafts. Some training has also been given in computer skills.

Ecopapel helped in the reconstruction of the dwellings of some of the families who were in very marginal conditions following the disastrous impact of the 1998 El Niño phenomenon.

Benefits from the work activity are shared according to the quantity of paper ordered and produced. When there are large orders, there is a bonus system so that everyone benefits. Earnings received from recycling paper are greater than comparable alternatives, and participants enjoy their work as a form of creative expression.

Biodiversity Impacts.
The successful model of Ecopapel has been a leading conservation initiative in the community for 11 years and has had a significant influence in the community process that led to the declaration of Bahía as an “Eco-city”.

Since this declaration, other local recycling groups in Bahía have been formed involving over 150 women, children and teenagers. Such is the success of the initiative that now waste paper needs to sourced much further a field – spreading the good news about recycling and sound environmental management.

Ecopapel has organized environmental education for school groups using field trips to see the recycling of paper and other organic material, organic agriculture, and reforestation. As part of the excursion, schools made a promise to begin their own ecological projects like separating and collecting paper within the schools, and making compost with the organic matter generated in the school canteen. Seventeen hundred children were taken on this field trip over a period of 5 months.

classifying waste paper for recycling

The use of dried plants in the decoration of the paper has had a positive effect on the value placed on natural biodiversity that would normally be considered as useless weeds, including the moyuyo plant used for binding the paper. The unique and extremely scarce tropical dry forest of Ecuador´s coast is logged and burned mostly for a monoculture style of high chemical use, agricultural production. Ecopapel helps place an added value on intact natural systems. The women workers also care for and grow many of the native plants and cultivated plants, nurturing a sustainable use of wild plants.

The activity of recycling in itself helps reduce the use of prime material in the making of paper. The population of Bahía is not only being taught how to recycle paper but to reuse it (use both sides) extending it’s useful life, which lessens the demand for paper.

Major clients have agreed to send a percentage of profits made from their particular orders to support the community environmental primary school run by Ecopapel´s founders.

Partnerships
Ecopapel works hand in hand with all levels of the community as well as the municipality of Bahía de Caráquez. Ecopapel has a strong working relationship with several local, national, and international environmental and fair trade organizations.

Ecopapel also has a solid relationship with the national fair trade organizations which began with their decision to sell the recycled paper products. It has been chosen as one of 13 artisan groups to participate in an electronic commerce course organised by CAMARI, Ecuador´s main fair trade organization. Through this opportunity, some of the workers are learning computer and accounting skills, and a web page is being developed.

Ecopapel has a close link with THE SLOTH CLUB and ACTMANG (Japanese organizations dedicated to environmental work and fair trade) and the Australian based RAINFOREST INFORMATION CENTRE. These organizations have conducted numerous tours to visit Ecopapel and their other environmental projects and have assisted in opening up new potential markets.

Other supporting organizations are Latin American Task Force who helps by allowing a portion of payment for workshops or bonuses.

Forming new sheets of paper

Status and Sustainability
Ecopapel has been operating since 1992.

The key social elements are the creation of employment, poverty reduction, a sustained family economy, decrease in migration to city slums, improvement in health through the education provided, and a strong sense of community within the company itself.

Ecopapel has facilitated a revaluation of the local culture - decorations and printing often use ancient Bahían archaeological designs that have been declining in popularity.

As an institution Ecopapel has provided an exemplary model of working conditions and harmonious community relationships. The project has expanded opportunities for environmental education in the wider community and provided a replicable model for other groups around Ecuador.

Ecopapel provides the principle income to some 36 families as well as raising funds for ecological projects in Bahía de Caráquez. It has contributed to enhancing the image of Bahía as an ecological tourist site, which in turn assists the economic sustainability of the whole community.

It is a stable business initiative in the very unstable economic atmosphere of Ecuador. The project is easily replicable with minimal capital inputs, based on a wide and diverse customer base and is small enough to be extremely personal and flexible in terms of creativity.

The process of paper recycling reduces use of dwindling forests, makes use of waste products, and does not generate any contamination or waste.

The workers are empowered to value environmental protection and their own native forest resources in both a practical and aesthetic sense.

Environmental education campaigns have facilitated the visit of 1700 school children to view the process and to challenge personal environmental impacts. Hundreds of international visitors have also visited the project, and have gained new insight on ways to achieve integrated conservation and development.

Proceeds from the sale of the paper are used towards environmental projects including a local environmental primary school.

EcoPapel has had a formative impact on the initiative of Bahía as an Ecocity, has been featured in many television reports and newspaper/magazine articles. It has become well known in Ecuador through the media.

Decorating the new paper products with natural flowers, seeds shells etc