Earning forex with coconut fiber

Earning forex with coconut fiber

By Bambang Tiong

YOGYAKARTA (JP): Coconut husk fiber used to be ignored because
it wasn't considered useful. It was mostly used simply for fire
wood, mats or sofas. But thanks to one person's creativity, it is
now capable of yielding foreign exchange.

Johny Susanto, 37, and a Yogyakarta resident, has succeeded in
making a breakthrough in making good use of coconut husks; he
turns them into colorful flowers.

"Coconut husk has in fact a high-potential. The only thing is
it needs to be processed efficiently and presented in an
attractive way," said Johny, a craftsman who has been in the
business for a year and a half.

He says there are plenty of souvenirs that can be produced
from coconut husks. But his experience taught him that imitation
flowers were the most popular. This made him decide to only
produce the flowers, such as sunflowers and lotus flowers.

The idea to create souvenirs from a cheaper material came when
he was walking along Yogyakarta's main drag Jl. Malioboro,
looking at the various costly souvenirs offered by the sidewalk
traders. A few days later, he accidentally saw a few pieces of
coconut husk lying in a garbage can. After looking to his left
and then to his right, ashamed of being seen, he picked up the
coconut husk and took it home.

Since then, Johny, whose batik business collapsed due to the
monetary crisis, has found a life again.

With an initial investment of no more than Rp 100,000, he
bought 500 coconut husks from the Wates area for Rp 50 a piece.
The price has now increased to Rp 100.

He then made various imitation flowers from the coconut husk.

At first, he only sold his works to a limited amount of
people: his friends. Unexpectedly, others people, including
souvenir vendors, also ordered his flowers.

He then increased his production and is now being assisted by
30 workers, each of whom produce 20 large flowers (lotus and
sunflower) and 75 small flowers (orchids) a day. These days, he
produces at least 600 flowers a day.

He pays his workers -- 80 percent of them housewives and the
remaining 20 percent women living in his neighborhood -- based on
the quantity of flowers produced. Each of them receives Rp 500
for making a big flower and Rp 250 for a small one.

Johny said his workers train for around 10 days to two weeks
to acquire the necessary skills. After mastering the techniques,
they are then given the material to work at home. The flowers are
then delivered to him by the workers the next morning.

One of the workers, Winarto, 29, confirmed that earlier he
couldn't make coconut husks into imitation flowers, but learned
the skills in the training period. Now, he proudly claimed he had
money to buy himself food and cigarettes.

Process

Before the production process, good quality coconut husks must
be found.

According to Johny, the coconut husk must be old because it
has the right texture, durable and the finished product will not
wrinkle easily. The hard skin of the coconut must first be peeled
off so that only the husk is used.

When making a flower, the coconut husk is split into eight
parts, and each part is later divided into three. Thus, a coconut
husk produces 24 sheets depending on the size of the flowers with
an average thickness of four millimeters.

To avoid wrinkles, the old coconut husk is then dried in the
sun for a number of days to reduce its water content. But the
husk must not become too dry. "If it is too dry it is difficult
to form the flower's sepals," Johny explained.

The sepals are then colored using food colorants in accordance
with the color of the flowers. The next step is arranging the
sepals into a whole flowers and a stem using glue. The stem is
made of bamboo or rattan, is 50 cms long and has a diameter of a
baby's little finger.

Agel thread, which is made of flax (rami), is then used to
cover and strengthen the joint between flower and stem, while the
stem is also covered with a banana stem to give it a natural
look.

Each flower's crown is made out of chips of coconut husk
obtained from leftovers from the making of the sepals, and some
leaves glued to the stem. The flowers' leaves are made of corn
leaves. A coconut husk can produce two or three flowers depending
on its size.

The imitation flowers are sold for between Rp 1,000 and Rp
2,000, and have now reached big cities like Jakarta and Surabaya.
Some are even exported to Europe and the United States.

Although Johny has to produce many flowers, he finds no
problem since the raw material is always there.

"Coconut fiber is no problem. My problem is that I cannot cope
with filling the orders," said Johny, whose monthly turnover now
amounts to Rp 75 million with around 20 percent profit.

His customers usually place their order, pay for it and the
goods are then delivered. Johny prefers to send his flowers by
train since it is assured they will remain intact.

"The export of my goods is handled by a colleague in Jakarta,"
he said.