Plant Fiber Paper

Paper is made from cellulose fibers that are found in all plant cell walls. The fibers may come from any one of several plant sources such as wood, bamboo, cotton, esparto, hemp, jute, sugar cane, wheat, or rice. However, wood is the material which is commonly used for this purpose.

More than half of all trees harvested are chipped up for the paper mills which results in deforestation; because of deforestation and the high cost of wood pulp, a number of countries are turning back to other sources of fiber. As a result of this environmental consciousness among the present communities, the usage of alternative fiber has gained popularity, which is production of pulp for paper from the plant fibers, using no wood products at all, so that the last few trees remaining on the planet may be spared. Also, studies have found that these plant-fiber processes are significantly less expensive than wood-pulp paper making.

Handmade plant fiber paper can be used for a multitude of uses like, they can be used to produce, printing and writing papers, linerboard, corrugating medium, newsprint, tissue and specialty papers. Paper can be fabricated from many kinds of plant fibers among which cotton is the most common and favored specially for the purpose of painting and manipulation. However, there exists great variety of possible sources of plant fiber. Usually plant fiber pulps can be grouped into two broad categories:

Hardwood substitutes
Such as sugarcane bagasse, bamboo, reeds and grasses, kenaf, corn stalks, etc.
Softwood substitutes
Such as cotton staple, flax, hemp and kenaf bast fibers, sisal; abaca; bamboo etc.