Cabinet nod to empower women in the Micro, Small and Medium Business sectors – The Island

By Hiran H.Senewiratne

A local company which had come up with an innovative project to recycle shredded/discarded currency notes, has obtained clearance from international patent rights bodies to go ahead with the enterprise even as multiple inquiries pour in from EU countries to buy the product for a considerable payment.

‘When this innovation was offered to the Sri Lankan authorities they paid neither attention nor requested after this eco-friendly currency disposable method. But it is now slated to start up as an international level business and some EU countries are offering billions of dollars, for the enterprise, Ceylon Eco Friendly Products (Pvt) Ltd chief Udaya Gunaratne said.

Gunaratne added: ‘The new method is registered under the international patent system, the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) of World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), with the file reference PCT/IB2023/057500. The International Searching Authority, which is the Korean Patent Office, has issued the International Search Report with A grade. More importantly, in the Written Opinion it has identified this invention as novel, inventive and industrially applicable.

‘Disposing of old currency is a major environmental problem the whole world faces. When the old currency is burnt it emits obnoxious fumes into the air and if it is buried the soil gets polluted. My innovative old currency disposable method is done by using fruits and vegetables.

‘We have developed a method and technique to use discarded currency notes to produce a strengthened material and a few vegetables and fruits, such as bottled gourd, sweet melon and lime are used in the process. We use a substance made out of these fruits to melt the shredded currency. We believe that fruit farmers of this country will benefit from my project as we can purchase fruits from them.

‘About 200 million grown trees are cut down yearly for paper-making. In other words, 24 grown trees are required to prepare 1 ton of paper. Currency notes are printed using high quality papers. More than 100 million tons of discarded currency notes are destroyed by Central Banks around the world. Discarded currency notes are burned, or destroyed using various methods while small amounts are reused as raw material.

‘My project would save thousands of trees from being felled, thus contributing to the preservation of the environment. The quantity of discarded currency notes worldwide amounts to multiple millions of tons, which could be used to manufacture the strengthened material in question. The latter could be used for the manufacture of particle high rise buildings, vehicle bonnets, upholstery and in many other industries.

‘The recycled currency notes have various usages, including manufacturing of stationery, packaging materials, souvenir items and even serve as a substitute for wooden planks.

‘I am planning to approach the authorities of a few countries to get his project going. I am confident that I will be able to go international, now that I have got patent rights. It is possible to get 60 tons of shredded currency notes per day, while 20 tons could be secured from Indonesia per day. If I was supported by the Sri Lankan authorities I would have been able to bring in $ 1.2million per month. Sri Lanka would not have to go through the painstaking debt restructuring process if such projects went ahead as the funds earned would have solved the forex issue.

‘I am also planning to launch another ambitious project to come up with an innovative kind of train ticket which could be printed locally. Vegetable seeds could be included in the manufacturing of these tickets. When added to the soil, these tickets yield plants of use.

‘Such projects would help the Sri Lankan people to cut down on their expenditure for essential food crops. More importantly, Sri Lanka would be able to cut down on its import expenditure and correct its balance of payment disequilibrium to a great extent. However, it is still left to be seen whether the country would make use of entrepreneurs such as us.’