Another monthly report where nothing much happened: PPY’s...

Another monthly report where nothing much happened:

PPY’s website currently claims that Sohag is producing raw material from banana trunks and employs 27 people, and the Sharqiah Moulding Plant is producing 2000 egg trays per hour and has 21 staff.

Back in the August 2022 Newsletter:

Papyrus is also on the verge of signing a factory deal with Al Ahram for Plastics, which will enable Al Ahram to transition from their current plastic based food packaging to environmentally friendly banana fibre. This is the first such transition worldwide and the beginning of a new era of sustainable packaging products in Egypt which we are proud to play a part in.

In the December 2022 Newsletter it was claimed:

During the past 12 months the company had

· enhanced the dewatering process to produce organic liquid fertiliser, Musa,

• tripled the production capacity in our banana fibre production plant in Sohag,

• achieved commercial-scale production in our banana fibre moulding plant in Sharqiah,

In April 2023:

Operational Activities and Business Development

7. The team have completed further equipment upgrades to ensure the plant can run sustainably at the target production rates.

9. The Sharqiah factory continued to produce moulded banana blended fibre egg cartons for commercial sale from banana fibre produced in Sohag.

However, by this September report had withered to the following (NO mention of Sharqiah):

Operational Activities and Business Development

9. The Sohag fibre processing factory completed installation of a new auto feeding chipper for the large banana pseudo-stems and an upgraded conveyor for increased capability of the now automated line.

10. The Sohag team have turned their focus to concentrating the extracted organic liquid with laboratory tests and experiments undertaken on dewatering to 20% concentration. Other testing on fermentation and upgrading dewatering capability and capacity are underway.

The Yellow Pallet project from 2021 has gone on without PPY see https://www.yellow-pallet.com/ and seems to be ramping up quite successfully using banana fibre for pallets. The Al Ahram proposal has disappeared altogether (The Al Ahram product catalogue is ALL plastic).

There does not seem to be any current production of “Musa” fertiliser or egg cartons anymore (otherwise surely they would tell us!), so what is left apart from more tinkering?, and a Plant that is going to the Egyptian Government that seems to have been on the boat for months.