Ecomadera Cubana is a project that self-employed workers (TCP) from the municipality of Fomento, in the central province of Sancti Spíritus, created for the manufacture of what they have called plastic wood, from recycling, and has already exceeded the national territory after signing your first export contract.

The initiative arose in 2014, when its founders, the engineer Pavel Sánchez and the lawyer Yoel Torres, began to elaborate the synthetic material with waste from the manufactures of the non-agricultural cooperative (CNA) La Esperanza. In an interview with Negocios en Cuba, Sánchez details that after several months of research and testing, on March 21, 2015 they managed to industrially obtain the product with that name, which they assumed as the commercial name of the project.

FIRST EXPORT AND PROJECTIONS

“With the signing of our first export contract, through the company BK ImportExport, the country incorporates to its portfolio a product with high added value, backed by technological innovation,” he assures.

The 24 tons of material sent to the Dominican Republic open a way of collaboration before the growing interest of the nations in the area, he affirms. One of the projections is to consolidate the potential oriented abroad with the incorporation of services, in response to requests from local and international clients.

Walkways for the dunes, bridges, platforms, pallets, perimeter fences and wall veneer are some of its main items.

PRODUCTIONS BENEFIT TOURISM

The project is on the rise and the engineer Lenier Díaz and Yoeldys Morales participate in the coordination, in a union where TCP and state-owned companies in the country intervene in the collection and supply of raw material.

After being transformed into columns, beams, joists, boards and other elements of plastic wood, in accordance with the interests of the clients, they become useful in works carried out, mainly, by cooperative entities.

These works benefit various sectors of the economy, such as tourism, consolidating a productive chain. Among the facilities that Ecomadera Cubana has reached are hotels in the island’s largest spa, Varadero, in the western province of Matanzas.

We also supply other economic sectors, in particular in the provinces of Havana, Matanzas, Villa Clara, Sancti Spíritus and Santiago de Cuba, he adds.

ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT

In the country, some 400 thousand tons of plastic waste are generated each year, according to estimated calculations, while recycling recovers between four thousand and five thousand tons, just over one percent of the total waste of that origin, explains Sánchez .

Where does the rest go? It starts to contaminate aquifers and sanitary landfills for centuries, he adds. The technological procedure includes the collection, the selection of the type of plastic, the crushing and the washing. All the machines involved are handmade, designed and built by innovators of the project.

“During the first year we processed about 14 tons, currently it ranges over 500 per year, and by 2022 our eyes are set on reaching 1,000”, he says. In these years we recycle a similar amount of garbage, which represents the equivalent of stopping the cutting of 10,000 trees, of emitting 1,500 tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and we saved the country about two million dollars by way of import substitution , stresses.

We maintain close alliances with educational centers and institutions committed to caring for the environment, such as the National Company for the Protection of Flora and Fauna, he highlights. Each of the actions are aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals of the UN 2030 Agenda, and our work contributes to the fulfillment of seven of those purposes and to the National Plan for Economic and Social Development until that year, he says.