Quantum of Sawdust: Sustainable Uses for Waste Products in Furniture Manufacture
A recently published article discusses the potential of using waste materials from the furniture manufacturing process to create various other products as part of a more sustainable process, and an unlikely option emerges as a means of a ‘greener’ process…
Sawdust.
That’s right, there’s more to sawdust than pulp or mulch. In fact, this often maligned and readily dismissed material could in fact be the key to helping manufacturing companies across the world to operate in a much more Fair Trade way for its team and the environment. These new ideas are a far better use for sawdust than what currently happens to it in most if not all manufacturing processes: absolutely nothing at all.
Fair Trade Developments
Here at Fair Trade Furniture, our commitment to Fair Trade values means that we’re always on the lookout for new developments in the industry. While we don’t currently utilise sawdust in any of our ranges, it’s definitely something that we’re interested to learn more about.
The article makes a case study of a furniture factory in Zimbabwe and reviews the “quantum of sawdust” that they produce each year. In short, there was a lot. Which means a lot of waste products to dispose of. Until they had a better idea…
More Sustainable Practices
Plans are being put into place for factories like this one to turn their excessive amounts of sawdust waste into an abundance of opportunity. This product is put back into the system that it would otherwise be forced out of and put to good use.
The example company in question uses machinery to create furniture, which produces a lot of wasted sawdust as a result. But by recycling this material in a sustainable way, the company and others like it would be able to work in a ‘greener’ and more sustainable way – as well as making back some money in the process.
Fair Trade Furniture – Sustainable, Eco-Friendly Conservatory Furniture
By investing in briquetting machines to squeeze down biomass materials like sawdust, off-cuts and shavings into squares, sticks and other shapes which can be used as fuel. This makes waste management less time-consuming and troubling, instead turning it into a simple, cost-effective opportunity for sustainable living and working.
For more information about how we at Fair Trade Furniture operate with our important values at the centre of what we do, click here. If you want to find out more about our sustainable manufacturing processes and what our teams in Indonesia are doing for ‘greener’ practices, we welcome you to get in touch with our team today.