JOHOR BAHRU, 23rd. June: The project leading to this MEMORANDUM OF UNDERSTANDING (MOU) between Sawipac and UTM began modestly in 2009 as a fact-finding and exploration research project in Kluang, Johor.
A project account was established at Uni-Technologies Sdn Bhd. in 2010 to facilitate the flow of funds for the deployment of this project to develop an Incubation Center at C.L.E.A.R. Skudai.
CLEAR has collaborated as a partner in the application of a CRDF-MTDC grant from Sawipac in 2010. Appreciatively, this collaboration bore fruit in the granting of CRDF by a MTDC approved project with the title “The Palm Biomass-Biofertiliser for Multiple Plants Applications”. As a result, a start-up fund of RM 15,000 was granted to CLEAR UTM by Sawipac to advise and assist in the implementation of the project.
The primary objective of biofertiliser projects is the production of high quality biofertiliser by using green technology with low carbon usage techniques for multiple plant applications. For the present day, the production of conventional fertilizers only comes from specific biomass materials to be used for a single plant species. However, this biofertiliser is produced by using the green compress technique. The raw materials used are multiple palm wastes such as palm oil mill effluent (POME), empty fruit bunch (EFB) and oil palm trunks (OPT) which will be compressed to produce fertilizer that comprises different nutrients and can be applied in various plants.
A number of uniqueness of this product are as below:
- Applicable for multiple plants from different species such as vascular plants (orchids) and low vegetable plant (tomato)
- Symbiotically associates with plant roots. Involved microorganisms could readily and safely convert complex organic material into simple compounds, so that the compounds can be easily taken up by plants.
- Maintains the natural habitat of the soil.
- It can also provide protection against drought and some soil-borne diseases.
- Cost-effective, relative to chemical fertilizers.
- Environmentally friendly in that it not only prevents the damage of the natural source but also helps to some extent by cleansing the plant from precipitated chemical fertilizers
Hence, in this collaboration, UTM and Sawipac will co-develop, validate and standardize the production system for full-scale production, commercialization and marketing of the product.
