Rejuvenating Morocco’s historic date palm industry has swelled the income of millions of agricultural workers, but the crop’s renaissance has also caused environmental problems that a trio of young Moroccans are determined to solve, writes Matt Smith.
Mohammed Harakate, Meriem Nadi and Ayoub Habik are co-founders of Alternative Solutions, a start-up that takes palm waste and transforms it into environmentally-friendly wooden sheets that can be used in construction and interior design.
Although easy to summarise, the process of creating the company – which began operations in 2017 - and honing the manufacturing process were anything but.
“We’ve done well to survive two years already in Morocco – launching a start-up, especially social impact businesses, isn’t easy,” says Harakate, 27, who is co-founder and chief executive of Alternative Solutions.
HISTORIC PALMS
Morocco was once among the world’s biggest date producers before a fungus known as Bayoud disease killed over 12 million palms in the 20th century.
The country began to revitalise the industry in the mid-2000s, with annual production hitting 128,000 tonnes in 2016. The government aims to increase this to 160,000 tonnes by 2020 and has helped plant millions of new trees, with the crop providing up to 60% of the income of 14 million Moroccans.
But rejuvenating the industry is also causing environmental problems. The Drâa-Tafilalet region, located in the Atlas Mountains, produces 85,000 tonnes of dates annually, plus an estimated 75,000 tonnes of associated waste.
On a work trip to the region, Harakate saw first-hand the environmental problems that this waste causes. Usually, it is either left to rot on land that could otherwise be cultivated, or is burnt, spewing carbon dioxide and other pollutants into the atmosphere.
In contrast, cutting away and removing the waste leaves and wood makes the palm trees healthier and increases date production. Some farmers, with nowhere to dispose of the waste, often fail to cut back the trees sufficiently, which can lower production and even cause them to die.
So, the young entrepreneurs decided to find a better solution, inspiring the name of their company. Renting a warehouse in El Jadida city, 100 kilometres south-west of Casablanca, the trio designed their own machinery that could process the palm waste – via a complicated five-step process – into half-metre square boards that are certified by French quality assurance firm Ceribois.
The company then sells these boards to interior design companies and real estate developers, which use them to make tables, chairs, flooring, wall mountings and other furniture.
“The idea is to find ecological, alternative solutions for what to do with waste materials,” says Harakate. “The wood panels are just the first of many products we will launch – once we can manufacture that to sufficient scale, we’ll diversify.”
The company’s expansion plans include making furniture in-house from the recycled palm wood as well as converting palm fronds into handicrafts and organic feed for livestock. Currently, it can recycle 40% of palm waste, but once it begins re-using the leaves it will be able to recycle it all.
“Our first challenge was to build the machine that could process the palm waste – we did through reverse engineering. The next challenge was finding funding. After that it was a matter of finding customers to buy our product.”
The firm currently produces 100 square metres of wood panels per month. Once the company receives more funding, it will increase production. It aims to attract 2 million Moroccan dirhams ($208,000) of new funding in 2020, enabling it to expand to Europe and North America.
Alternative Solutions has so far received 750,000 Moroccan dirhams from various backers including the Moroccan Center for Innovation and Social Entrepreneurship, the World Bank and Bidaya Funds, a green-tech incubator.
The company has four full-time employees, while it also works with NGOs in Drâa-Tafilalet to arrange delivery of the palm waste to its factory.
“The aim is to also create permanent jobs in Drâa-Tafilalet in the long term,” concludes Harakate.