Forget Charmin, Cottonelle, or Quilted Northern. In Japan, there’s a new toilet paper roll on shelves, and it’s nothing like the others.
The Shibushi Osaki Roll is the world’s first toilet paper made from recycled diapers — and it’s available to purchase at seven stores in southwest Japan’s Kyushu.
While it may be difficult to wrap one’s head around, the team of local governments and private firms behind the Shibushi Osaki Roll say the toilet paper is perfectly safe to use — and could be a game-changer for the environment.
“Please support this eco-friendly product, which aims to promote a sustainable society by reusing local resources,” said Takumi Obo, a spokesperson for the Osaki municipal government’s SDGs Promotion Council, which is leading the product’s roll-out.
The project was spearheaded by the city of Shibushi and the town of Osaki in Kagoshima Prefecture. The two municipalities have a joint waste management system and came together to begin recycling disposable diapers.
The two cities collected 98 tons of diapers and other used hygiene products. They were all sterilized, deodorized, and bleached before being shredded into a pulp. From there, the treated materials were mixed with recycled paper at a local Poppy Paper Co. plant and transformed into rolls of toilet paper.
In the first two months of production, 30,000 rolls were created and are now being sold for just 400 yen — or about $2.70 — per dozen.
While it may not be something people think about while doing their business, the traditional pulp toilet paper most of us are used to has a significant environmental impact.
According to The World Counts, 712 million trees are felled yearly to produce virgin pulp toilet paper, which contributes to deforestation worldwide. And for a single roll of toilet paper, 1.5 pounds of wood are required for production.
Additionally, one roll of toilet paper requires up to 37 gallons of water to be produced, while recycled toilet paper takes up about half of that.
Disposable diapers are also a major waste management issue. In fact, disposable diapers are the third-largest single consumer item in landfills. And they take an estimated 500 years to decompose.
The Shibushi Osaki Roll represents a new frontier for a wood, waste, and water-saving alternative in Japan. And while these two municipalities tackle a small piece of that larger issue, the effort could prove viability on a much larger, global scale
“This initiative could help diversify the ways to secure raw materials,” Satoshi Yoshida from Poppy Paper Co., told The Mainichi, “especially as used paper supplies are expected to decline with the rise of paperless systems and a shrinking population.”
Header image courtesy of Osaki Municipal Government's SDGs Promotion Council
