Avocado Fork

Good News Good Planet

For more delicious news, go to www.GoodNewsGoodPlanet.com, and scroll to bottom for more ways to find the feel good stuff!* AVOCADO FORK From pit to plastic A Mexican company has created a pollution solution from its most favorite fruit. BIOFASE (Bee-o Fassa) offers a line of cutlery and straws created from avocado pits. Founder Scott Munguia came up with the idea while studying chemical engineering. He observed that avocado seeds have a molecular structure similar to corn, which is often used in bioplastics but is expensive and it’s a useable food. His home country of Mexico produces half of the world's avocado supply but leaves a waste product of millions of seeds. Munguia theorized a solution and set about finding a way to make low-cost biopolymers from the discarded pits. A year and a half later, his business had created resins that can be mixed into plastics making them more compostable. The resulting products are strong, tolerant to heat and cold, and designed to biodegrade in just 240 days rather than the 10 to 10,000 years normal plastics take to decompose. They break down without needing to be separated for recycling and have a lower carbon footprint. These avocado alternatives are also affordable, selling for the same price as their traditional counterparts. The company ships its cutlery and straws to over 19 countries worldwide. While that's only a drop in the bucket of the 6-billion-dollar plastics industry, what makes BIOFASE extraordinary is how they take local waste and transform into something sustainable and profitable. What's next for the award-winning Mexican startup? "Our company aims to become an international leader in the development and distribution of bioplastics," says Munguia, who is back in the lab, finding more ways to turn food waste into useful products. He hopes other types of biomass can help replace plastics globally. Until then, he's building a better world now, one avocado pit at a time. #### *Hungry for more of the Good Stuff? Search "Good News Good Planet" on YouTube, Instagram, Patreon, Alexa and wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts.