BOSS Magazine feature article on EcoPlanet Bamboo's combined strategy of certified bamboo plantations and innovative manufacturing technology to provide a comprehensive solution to some of the world's largest wood and fiber industries.

1. EcoPlanet Bamboo
Bamboo Fiber for the FuturE

2. INNOVATION EcoPlanet Bamboo
1 | thebossmagazine.com | May 2017
BAMBOO FIBER F
ECOPLANET BAMBOO IS
ONE FALLOW F
WRITTEN BY ANNE-FR
Bamboo has long been marketed to eco-conscious consumers
for a range of niche products. Yet outside of China, where most
bamboo goes into three products—shoots for food, bamboo
handicrafts, and flooring—bamboo was not a viable raw
resource for the world’s largest timber and fiber manufacturing
companies or industries.
Why not? Because there simply wasn’t a source that could
meet security and volume of supply, nor meet the increasingly
stringent environmental regulations of western markets.
Untapped potential in a
myriad of markets that could
be disrupted by a sustainable
bamboo fiber led EcoPlanet
Bamboo CEO and Co-founder,
Troy Wiseman, to take on
the challenge.
“Combined forest landscape
restoration and avoided

3. FOR THE FUTURE
CHANGING THE WORLD,
IELD AT A TIME
RANCES HUTCHINSON
deforestation through a market-
driven solution is central to our
mission,” he said. “We started
the company to address the
world’s increasing demand for
wood and fiber products.
“These markets continue to
drive deforestation across the
world—not just in developing
countries, but in places such as Canada and Northern Russia,
and for products such as toilet paper that we use for a few
seconds before throwing away.”
Plantation-grown timber takes too long to get to market.
There are too few plantation forests in the global south with
sustainability certifications. Both factors diminish the
ability of plantation forests to become a realistic alternative
to deforestation.

4. INNOVATION
“We wanted to come up with
an alternative that could be
achieved within a realistic time
frame and that could produce
the increasing volumes of fiber
that exploding middle class
populations around the world
require,” Wiseman added.
Restoring Degraded Forests
to Disrupt Fiber Markets
EcoPlanet Bamboo’s “new
generational plantations” are
grown only on degraded land
and focus on parts of the
globe where deforestation has
been extreme. The company
has fully-established bamboo
plantations in Nicaragua and
in the eastern cape of South
Africa, and has additional
plantation development
underway in the Ashanti region
of Ghana.
Combined, the company’s
current land holdings have
the potential to supply global
fiber markets with an annual
yield exceeding one million
tons of bamboo fiber—a
volume sufficient to really
disrupt global markets for
target products.
“When we first started in
2010 no one was really
talking about alternative
fibers. Between 2013 and
now, EcoPlanet Bamboo
has seen an exponential
increase in interest and levels
of commitment from major
players, particularly in two
industries: pulp for paper
and packaging, and pulp
for sustainable textiles,”
Wiseman said.
However, the company’s
research proves the
uncomfortable reality for
many global firms aiming to
drive a market shift towards
responsible, renewable, and
deforestation free fiber: it
goes beyond just sourcing
the fiber itself.
Although bamboo is
always marketed as an
environmentally friendly
alternative, the reality is that
the manufacturing process—
if not carefully designed—
can be very inhospitable to
the planet and negate the
benefits of the bamboo fiber.
“THE REALLY BIG PLAYERS, THE
WORLD’S BIGGEST CLOTHING AND
PAPER BRANDS, THEY AREN’T
WILLING TO MAKE THE SWITCH TO
AN ALTERNATIVE FIBER WITHOUT A
FULLY ENCOMPASSING SOLUTION.”
-TROY WISEMAN, CEO AND CO-FOUNDER

6. INNOVATION
5 | thebossmagazine.com | May 2017
“The reality is that current processing in China for our key
target markets—paper, packaging, and textiles—is a dirty
industry. You lose most of the benefits of your renewable,
sustainable bamboo fiber if it’s manufactured in a way that
leaves a wake of nasty environmental waste.
“The really big players, the world’s biggest clothing and paper
brands, they aren’t willing to make the switch to an alternative
fiber without a fully encompassing solution.”
EcoPlanet Bamboo has been developing the resource base of
a sustainable alternative fiber. At the same time, the company
is heavily investing in the bamboo-based technology solutions
necessary to provide a new generation with a product that
meets the strictest environmental standards at every step of
the supply chain.
The company’s industrial and product development teams have
worked with a suite of scientists and other technology partners
to refine these technology solutions. Together, they developed a
sample product that meets the specifications, quality, and, most
importantly, price of the wood and fiber products they hope
to displace.
Today, EcoPlanet Bamboo is ready to provide an
integrated solution.
The fiber from the company’s plantations in Nicaragua and
South Africa approaching maturity will be used in technology
developments that focus on sustainable packaging and sanitary
paper product solutions.
“Now that we can provide that end-to-end solution, we truly
believe that deforestation-free bamboo can take an increasing
share of established wood and timber markets,” Wiseman added.
“WE PROVIDE JOBS, AND OF COURSE
THE TRAINING THAT GOES WITH THOSE
JOBS, TO ANY INDIVIDUAL WHO HAS A
GOOD ATTITUDE AND WANTS TO WORK.
OUR AIM IS FOR THESE JOBS TO BE
PERMANENT AND LONG TERM.”
-TROY WISEMAN

7. Month 2015 | thebossmagazine.com | 6
Image taken on the Carribean coast of Nicarauga where the
plantations are located. Troy Wiseman leaves a meeting with the
indigious community leaders shortly after hiring over 300 workers
who had never had a formal job, 100 of them being women.

8. INNOVATION
7 | thebossmagazine.com | May 2017
Committed for the Life of the
Planet and its People
At this stage in the EcoPlanet
Bamboo company lifecycle, all
eyes are on the scalability of
the enterprise. Wiseman laid
out his three-step outline for
the company’s expansion plan.
“The first is to take all of our
existing bamboo plantation
operations in Nicaragua, South
Africa, and Ghana through
maturity and successfully
develop onsite manufacturing
entities for carefully selected
target end products. This
is well underway with our plantations in Nicaragua and South
Africa approaching their first harvest.
“The second is a global expansion, particularly with a focus on
the textile industry. Our current plantations are not targeting
this end product, but we have been working on the technology
solutions and the opportunity is significant. We have been
considering various options in Southeast Asia for this expansion.
“The third is to take everything we have learned and apply
it to a smallholder and outgrower farmer model. This will
allow the cost of production of a ton of bamboo fiber to drop
significantly, and in turn allow us to really target local markets
based off contextual drivers of deforestation: for example,
charcoal markets across Sub-Saharan Africa.”
The human aspect of the company’s mission is designed to
empower and sustain communities hard-hit by deteriorating

9. landscapes and a lack of opportunities for social improvement
and sustainable development. For EcoPlanet, that imperative
extends for generations.
“We provide jobs, and of course the training that goes with
those jobs, to any individual who has a good attitude and
wants to work. Our aim is for these jobs to be permanent
and long term,” said Wiseman.
“We are a fair and equal employer but we go far beyond that to
try and empower women because that tends to have an even
greater flow down effect on local development. We maintain
a minimum female employment of 25 percent across all of our
operations, including through to senior management positions.”
Dreaming Big–Conscientiously
“Our dream is to restore millions of hectares of land across
the world to enable our growing populations and those with
increased spending power to
shop, consume and increase
their quality of life, but without
that taking a disastrous toll on
our planet,” Wiseman stated.
“The reality of being an
entrepreneur and doing
something that no one else
has before is that there are
always ups and downs, periods
of fast growth and periods of
reflections. But not once in
have we ever wavered from
that mission.”

10. POWERED BY
EcoPlanet Bamboo
303 E. Main St, Suite 205
Barrington, IL 60010
Ph: 847.387.3609
Email: info@ecoplanetbamboo.com
www.ecoplanetbamboo.com
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