Bagasse is the dry pulpy fibrous residue that remains after sugarcane or sorghum stalks are crushed to extract their juice. It is used as a biofuel for the production of heat, energy, and electricity, and in the manufacture of pulp and building materials.

Agricultural waste, or agricultural residue, contains all parts of the plant that are released with the processing of agricultural crops like rice, grain, and sugarcane and are not suitable for human nutrition, like stems and leaves. This consists of about 80% of the harvest. The food industry only uses a small part of the agricultural crop. Often, only the seeds, fruits, roots and juices are used, which is about 20% of the plant. Because the vast majority of the plant is not of value to the food industry, we call this agricultural waste or agricultural residue. However, to envoPAP, it is anything but waste. We use it as a raw material for high quality paper and paperboard.

The four most cultivated agricultural crops worldwide are rice, grain, corn, and sugarcane. These crops have a total weight of over 16,500 billion kilos per year. About 80% of that weight can be regarded as agricultural waste and becomes available annually.

In Europe, all people and companies together use approximately 77.4 billion kilograms of paper and cardboard per year. To transport this volume, more than 5 million trucks are needed. To make these 77.4 billion kilograms of paper and carton, we only need about 1.8% of the worldwide available agricultural waste.

This has to do with paper demand, worldwide population growth, and technical innovation to be able to make high quality paper and paperboard nowadays from agricultural waste. A hundred years ago, paper and paperboard was also made from agricultural waste. However, due to quality aspects, the paper industry at the time switched to virgin wood fibers as raw material. envoPAP makes it possible to again use agricultural waste as the most logical raw material for paper and paperboard. This is what we call 'Wealth from Waste'.

We know that forests are threatened and endangered around the world, so it is important to us to find alternative materials that do not require virgin forest resources. With bagasse, we can still use high performing disposable "paper" products, but know that we are choosing a product that is made from rapidly renewable and reclaimed sugarcane instead of trees.

Most types of trees in Europe have a growing season of between 25 and 40 years. For pine and spruce, this is between 70 and 80 years. For birches, this is between 35 and 40 years. For eucalyptus trees, this is between 12 and 15 years. In comparison: agricultural land produces at least one harvest per year. Agricultural waste becomes available every year.