Tapping the Potential of Natural Plant materials toward Industry 6.0 - Sustainable Production and Consumption - TRIP 2.0 cenceptualisation

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An email piece send to colleagues 12/6/2018

Renewable Natural raw materials for Manufacturing Consumer Products - Towards Industry 6.0

(There are already several people coined Industry 6.0) but with conflicting visions. I am more keen towards positioning it with the one that identify sustainability and renewable materials)

Sustainable production and consumption often cites the cradle to cradle approach, that is the natural resources used for consumption will eventually be recycled back to be reproduced. However with most modern materials, the process of recycling or rebirth of raw materials often involved  activities that consume energy, produce emissions and impact environment. For example, to recycle plastic, there need to be collection, sorting, pre-treatment, melting, reconditioning and manufacturing. All these require energy consumption. To recycle steel would require almost as much energy as had we produced it freshly from excavated ores.

The use of naturally renewable materials such as bamboo, rattan, sustainably farmed trees, mengkuang, rasau, kercuk, etc, will create consumer products that can simply be thrown back to mother nature and the process of rebirth is taken care by natural ecosystem. In other words it can be coined as 'green recycling' (as opposed to simply recycling). This is what i propose the thrust of World Bamboo day will carry. This can be aligned with Sustainable Development Goal (SDG): Goal 12 - Responsible Production and Consumption.

In doing so, it is important to recognise an important side benefit of the concept. This will lead to the revival of the traditional skills working with natural materials such as traditional weavers, craftsmen and artisans who normally lives at the fringes of modern economic system. So it is proposed that this paradigm will empower local community who live in close proximity with natural plant resources, preserve and revive traditional knowledge and skills. These benefits will push the agenda to include to other SDGs, i.e. SDG 8 - Decent work and economic Growth and SDG 10 Reduced Inequalities.

The grand vision for Malaysia is to start developing the whole supply chain of consumer products based on natural plants available here that will offset in time, the hazardous and exhaustive consumer industry relying on synthetic or fossil based products. (mostly plastic based) . In this regards, UPM is poised to lead this thrust by our Translational Research Program 2.0, (Tapping the Potential of Natural Plant materials toward Industry 6.0 - Sustainable Production and Consumption) which will conduct activities that will invigorate the whole supply chain of consumer industry; from Plantation - Collection - distribution - manufacturing - disposal.

Among available projects/expertise already in place in UPM are:

Forestry - Timber Plywood and veneer from OPT, (Dr Edi Suhaimi)
FRSB - T.I.K.A.R. project (Prof Khairul Adlin), Teratak Semai (Weaved Bertam Wall Panel) -Dr Wan Srihani
Fac of Science - Kenaf retting (Dr Wan Zuhainis),
Fac of Agriculture - Plantation for sustainable production (many)
etc....


With this vision, the first activity that will materialise out of this initiative is to secure Malaysia as the host nd organiser of 12th World Bamboo Day 2021. UPM will work towards several activities leading up towards this aim.

Partners:
Prime Minister Department, Malaysia
World bamboo Organisation
Global Innovation & Entrepreneurship Foundation (GIEF)
MOHE
MOSTI
MITI
United Nation



DR. ZAKY

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