Organic Paper Pots: Horticulture market to Get a Green Push Towards Sustainable Agriculture

Ellepot, Ahlstrom-Munksjö, and OrganoClick have teamed up to serve the horticulture market with 100 percent biobased and biodegradable solutions. Organic 2.0 paper pot is a completely organic alternative for growing vegetables on a large scale. The new product has enabled the firms to enter the organic crop category, which is predicted to develop at a rapid pace in the future years.

Organic 2.0 is the result of a close collaboration between Ellepot, OrganoClick, and the R&D team of Ahlstrom-Munksjö. After years of collaboration, the three firms developed a more ecological and cost-effective method of growing plants by employing paper pots put directly into the soil. The pots deteriorate over time, allowing the roots of crops to enter the medium and promote the healthy development of the plant. Organic 2.0 paper pot is made entirely of compostable and biodegradable materials and decomposes in 6 to 8 weeks.

"Working with our suppliers to co-develop smarter materials for the Ellepot customized solution contributes to our aim of assisting customers in improving production efficiency, optimizing handling, and delivering better yields and reduced prices of items produced. We believe that the co-development will continue to create innovative and sustainable materials in the future, with the main characteristic being little effort and maximum effect "Lars Steen Pedersen, CEO of Ellepot A/S in Denmark, states.

"We at Ahlstrom Munksjö are constantly searching for new methods to develop in the field of sustainability. We are proud to have collaborated with Ellepot to service the horticulture market through their sustainability-driven business approach.

After several years of partnership, we are thrilled to have discovered a method to drive even more sustainable innovation with this game-changing new product. We plan to expand our partnership into other market categories where we feel this new product will provide the potential for all of us -says "Pierre Mary, VP of Nonwovens and abrasive,  Ahlstrom Munksjö's and Performance business.

Components of Organic 2.0: Binder Material

OrganoClick provides the biobased and biodegradable binder material for Organic 2.0, while Ahlstrom-Munksjö manufactures the nonwoven paper, and Ellepot designs the final product.

"We are extremely pleased with the partnership between Ahlstrom-Munksjö and Ellepot, which resulted in the development of a novel fossil-free, biodegradable nonwoven material utilized in Ellepot's plant pot. When bringing innovative eco-friendly products to market, it is critical to collaborate with partners throughout the whole value chain. We are delighted that, through collaborative efforts, we were able to replace current synthetic binders in the material with our 100 percent biobased and biodegradable binders "Mrten Hellberg, CEO of OrganoClick, adds, "binder."

Organic 2.0 has been nominated for the Sustainability Advancement Award, Short-Life Product Achievement Award, and Nonwoven Product Achievement Award at  IDEA Achievement Awards taking place this year. Furthermore, Ellepot, Ahlstrom-Munksjö, and OrganoClick are already discussing the next steps in their collaboration. The objective is to create more synthetic-fiber-free products while also expanding into other organic crop categories that require long degradation timeframes, such as landscape or forestry.