Extension of Forest Products in Bangladesh

M Sarwar Jahan

Pulp and Paper Research Division

BCSIR Laboratories, Dhaka

Introduction

• Bangladesh is a densely populated small country.

• Forest resources are very limited.

• Faces acute shortage of fibrous raw materials for pulp industry. Consequently. • There were four pulp mills in Bangladesh. Among these four

pulp mills three were shutdown.

• Only rayon mill was shutdown.

• So it needs alternative raw materials.

• Bangladesh is an agricultural country, which generates substantial amount of agricultural residues.

• Nonwood fibers are three types, i) annual crops/industrial crops, such as jute flax, hemp etc.

ii) agricultural residues, such as straw, corn stalks, cotton stalks etc.

iii) naturally occurring plant/wild plant such as bamboo, dhaincha, grasses etc.

Introduction (cont.)

Introduction (cont.)

• Interest is growing on developing renewable, sustainable, biomaterials, biochemicals and biofuel in order to reduce CO2 emission.

• In the forest policy of Bangladesh nothing was mentioned on biorefinery due to lack of knowledge.

• A possible strategy for biobased product development is proposed in this paper.

Contents

• Biorefinery • Forestry of Bangladesh

• Forest policy related to forest products

• Alternative raw materials

• Problems of alternative raw materials

• Possible solution

• Possible strategy in implementing IFB

Biorefinery is analogues to petroleum refinery. In this concept all

fraction of biomass will be used in producing biochemicals,

biomaterials and bio-fuel that will replace petroleum products.

Biorefinery allows a sustainable conversion of biomass into a

spectrum of marketable products (food, feed, materials, and

chemicals) and energy (fuels), and thereby is emerging as a more

sustainable substitute to the ‘Petroleum Refinery’

What is Biorefinery?

Integrated Forestry Bio-refinery (IFBR)

Source: Arthur J. Ragauskas et al Industrial Biotechnology 2(1)2006

Establishing and operating a biorefinery

requires: ❖ Detailed knowledge of multiple factors including

location, transportation facilities, scale of operation, raw

material, product portfolio, and conversion mechanisms.

❖ External factors such as governmental policies,

environmental, and market conditions may also

influence the success of a biorefinery.

❖ These interactions have to be understood to ensure

optimal performance.

Forest type Area (1,000

ha)

Natural

forest

Hill Forest

Sal Forest

Mangrove forest

Bamboo/ broad leaved forest

551

34

436

184

Plantation

forest

Long rotation forest plantation

Short and medium rotation forest plantation

Mangrove plantation

Rubber plantation

131

54

45

8

Other

wooded land

Shrubs

Swamps with shrubs

266

23

Forestry in Bangladesh Forest area in Bangladesh

Altrell, D. 2007. National forest and tree resources assessment 2005-2007, Bangladesh, FAO.

❖ The total area of Bangladesh is 14.757 million hectares.

❖ Cultivated land is 56%.

❖ Forestland under the management of BFD is close to 10%.

❖ Classified natural forest 84% and 16% plantation forest.

❖ The two largest areas of forest types are:

I. Hill Forest and

II. Mangrove Forest

Forestry in Bangladesh

Forest policy in Bangladesh

A few initiatives for forest products utilization were taken in

recent forest policy of Bangladesh:

• Modern and appropriate technology at all stages of extraction

and processing of forest products

• Modernization of forest-based industries to ensure maximum

utilization of the forest raw materials,

• Extension to grow fruit trees for producing more fruits along

with the production of timber, fuelwood and non-wood forest

products were emphasized.

• To make competitive and profit oriented, necessary steps is

supposed to be taken for state owned forest-based industries.

Forest policy in Bangladesh

But most of them was not implemented of this policy on

forest products so far. This may be due to

❖ lack of recognizing the importance of the knowledge of

technological advancement, and

❖ lack of organization of partners to support the policy.

Nothing was mentioned on biorefinery in forest policy.

Biorefinery should be implemented based on alternative raw

materials. This needs to be incorporated in the revised policy

that will be formulated.

Crops Production in

Bangladesh,

MT

Waste generated,

MT

Rice

Wheat

Maize

Sugar cane

52,231,000

1,302,300

1,525,000

4,121,350

78,346,500

1,953,450

1,525,000

1,524,900

Jute 1,391,000 3,477,500

Availability of some important crops and their wastes generated in 2014 in

Bangladesh (FAOSTAT 2016 http://faostat3.fao.org/download/F/FO/E)

Advantages: such as higher biomass yields, no competitions with edible crops or

land, eco-friendly production, their large commercial application is yet to occur.

Alternative raw materials

Crops α-cellulose

(%)

Lignin (%) Pentosan

(%)

Ash (%)

Rice

Wheat

Maize stalks

Bagasse

Jute

Jute stick

38.5

40.1

46.5

44.2

63.1

45.7

12.7

15.0

14.0

17.9

12.7

24.1

19.1

21.9

27.6

23.9

13.5

22.7

17.2

9.7

4.5

2.0

2.7

Chemical Characteristics

Anatomical differences

Straw vs wood

Problems in straw pulping

• High content of silica, which inhibits the recovery of black liquor in alkali pulping processes.

• High amount of fines, which cause problems of drainage, machine runnability.

• Collection of raw materials is difficult.

Solution

1) Hot water pre-extraction prior to pulping

improved drainage resistance without

affecting pulp yield and papermaking

properties.

2) Organic acid fractionation.

3) Potassium hydroxide pulping in biorefinery

initiative.

All these concepts are related to forest biorefinery

Pre-extracted pulp fibre

Jahan, MS et al., Journal of Biobased Materials and Bioenergy, 3(4), 380-385. Jahan MS et al. Carbohydrate polymers, 88(2), 583-588.

1) Hot water pre-extraction

Total sugar Lignin Acetic acid

Bagasse

Corn stalks

Kash

16.1

8.1

8.6

6.0

2.8

3.4

0.9

2.26

0.84

Properties of pre-extracted liquor

1) Hot water pre-extraction

Jahan, MS et al., Journal of Biobased Materials and Bioenergy, 3(4), 380-385. Jahan MS et al. Carbohydrate polymers, 88(2), 583-588.

Jahan, M. S. et al., (2015). Nordic Pulp & Paper Research Journal, 30(4). 562-567

Organic acid fractionation in dissolving pulp production

2) Organic acid fractionation

Organic acid fractionation in paper pulp production

2) Organic acid fractionation

Jahan, M. S. (2007). Industrial Crops and Products,

26(3), 324-331.

Jahan MS et al., (2016). Bioresource Technology, 219, 445-450.

Potassium hydroxide pulping in biorefinery initiative

3) KOH Pulping

Partnerships

• This is an agricultural waste based project,

therefore, set up a cooperative society among

the farmers will help to smoothly run the

project. Entrepreneur can make collaboration

with the cooperative society to implement the

project. Ultimately farmers will provide raw

materials to the mill and get value for the raw

material.

Possible strategy

Pulp mill

Pulp mill

Pulp mill

Pulp mill

Pulp mill

Cooperative society of agricultural wastes based biorefinery

Replicability

• The parts of the profits generated by this innovation

are sent to the farmers to improve their livelihood.

• This concept is also suitable for other agricultural

wastes. Therefore, plant can be set up in different

parts of the country based on the available

agricultural wastes in that particular area.

Conclusions

• Forest area is very limited and population density is very high in

Bangladesh, consequently wood resources cannot be utilized for

biobased product development.

• Bangladesh is an agricultural country, which generates

substantial amount of agricultural wastes.

• To use agricultural resources, new technology and strategy need

to be adopted, which are already developed in Bangladesh.

• Agricultural wastes based IFBR can be a viable option for

producing biofuel, biochemicals and biomaterials in addition to

pulp.

• Organic acid fractionation/KOH pulping of agricultural wastes

is an important viable choice.