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Monday, September 13, 2004
Editorials: Manna from waste
THE table of fine arts professor Estela Ocampo-Fernandez looks no different from other paper-strewn working areas in the humanities division of the University of the Philippines Cebu College.
But in reality, the paper trails crisscrossing Ocampo-Fernandez’s desk are more copious and dispersed. Comprising the bulk of that entire paper volume is waste.
If she is in the epicenter of trash lines creeping from the ports of Cebu City to towns in the northern and southern tips of the province, it is because Ocampo-Fernandez is part of a local network of educators, government employees and non-government workers practicing and spreading paper recycling long before “crisis” and “austerity” became politically correct cant.
It is an unusual day when she does not receive inquiries or requests related to paper craft, paper recycling or even the planting of materials to produce fibers for making paper. But the scholar of a 10-month course in Japanese hand-made papermaking was quick to acknowledge that she was easily outstripped by her trainee, Linda Linabog. The head of the Pier 6 Women Port Vendors Association is now busy meeting orders for paper craft and echoing her learning to other women.
People-friendly
Ocampo-Fernandez said the paper recycling technology is easy to promote because it is inexpensive and “fun.” Communities express a need for this form of appropriate technology.
She said the partnership of the SOW Center Inc. and the Stella Maris Seamen’s Center facilitated in making creative waste management a viable alternative livelihood for the wives of port vendors and seamen.
As a volunteer trainer and consultant of the Cebu Socio-Economic Empowerment and Development (Seed) Project (CSP), she saw people’s enthusiasm for and energy in paper recycling. The CSP, a cooperation between the Province of Cebu and the Japan International Cooperation Agency, ended last February. Aside from other interventions, the project organized pools of papermaking trainers in 43 towns in the north and south of Cebu, including the islands of Bantayan, Santa Fe, Madridejos, San Francisco, Poro, Tudela and Pilar.
Ocampo-Fernandez said CSP targeted schools and local government offices for paper recycling as these institutions generate voluminous documents, more than half of which can be reused. Another UP professor, Cherry Ballescas, encouraged students and teachers of Bogo Central School, CSP’s pilot in implementation and showcase, to produce recycled writing paper, test papers and school forms.
Zero waste
Recycling also fills the need of schoolchildren, parents and teachers in remote and less endowed communities. Through the Department of Education’s network and policy of incorporating recycling in the curriculum, the technology is more than handy for art and science projects and low-cost beautification projects for the classroom and home.
Ocampo-Fernandez said paper recycling is popular because the technology is simple and open to innovation. The basic papermaking method of pouring requires a mould and deckle, which can be improvised from mosquito mesh stretched on a frame.
The papermaking manual produced by CSP also includes innovations learned from the community. Instead of an expensive equipment like the pulper, a washing machine can disintegrate old paper in volume. Kitchen reliables like the mortar and pestle can be used for manual pulping. Ocampo-Fernandez remembered how Jenny, a non-formal educator in Pilar, substituted the mortar and pestle with a filled half-gallon water container and a block of wood.
To color hand-made paper, Ocampo-Fernandez said segregating the scraps will give the sheets a natural shade different from store-bought pigments. She said the town of Badian hosts a native plant called “tagum,” which yields an indigo dye.
Although Ocampo-Fernandez cautioned that paper recycling requires water, a scarce commodity in many areas of Cebu, the beauty of the art is that it relies on the serendipity of “found objects.” In island municipalities traditionally regarded as resource-poor, salago, indigenous shrubs and other fiber sources thrive in open ground and fallow farms.
Paper, one of the oldest art forms, continues to show, through recycling, that it is the key for civilization.
(September 13, 2004 issue)
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