#The beginnings of eco:fibr

Everything started with a documentary about bananas. 🍌

It was 2017 when a documentary showed how thousands of tons of bananas are destroyed every year simply because they do not meet export standards. These images moved a lecturer at Leibniz University Hannover to reach out to Enactus Hannover to do something about the waste. Niklas and Merit were among those who took on this challenge. 🌱

With the original idea of extracting pulp from banana peels and turning it into textiles, the two of them made their first trip to Costa Rica less than a year later. Costa Rica showed them something very different from what they had anticipated. After visiting a banana plantation and talking to various locals, it quickly became clear that the problem of banana waste there was already being handled well. Instead, the farmers were struggling with an entirely different waste problem: the residues of the pineapple plant. 🍍

After harvest, enormous quantities of plant-based biomass remain in the fields, often chemically dried and then burned. An ecological and economic problem that remains unsolved in many growing regions to this day. Niklas and Merit saw in this a potential worth pursuing. 🌿

A detour that changed everything. What began as one idea became a new question, and from that question eco:fibr was born.

Sometimes you don't find what you are looking for, but something that matters even more.🚀