Elephas Maximus Maximus is the Latin name for the Sri Lankan elephant, a sub species of the Asian elephant. It grows to a weight of up to 5 tonnes and eats on average 180kg of vegetation a day. The elephant produces 100kg of dung per day and when Thusitha Ranasinghe discovered the wonderful paper making qualities of this cellulose rich material Maximus Elephant Paper was born.
Maximus Elephant Paper is 100% recycled, made from Elephant Dung and Post-Consumer Waste Paper. Manufactured in Sri Lanka, a country where traditionally elephants and humans have competed over scarce land resources resulting in injury on both sides, the production of the paper directly contributes to the villager’s income linking it to the survival of the elephants. Maximus Elephant Paper was recognized in 2006 as the winner of the BBC World Challenge , a global competition for small businesses that have shown enterprise and innovation at a grass roots level. The paper again proved its green credentials, winning the Co-op America’s “Green Business” of the year Leadership Award in 2008.
Beginning in a small factory in Kegalle, in what is now the Millennium Elephant Foundation (affiliated to the World Society for the Protection of Animals), Maximus has expanded to employ more than 120 local villagers. A second factory has now been built in Dambulla, situated on the elephant migration trail. Here they process dung collected by locals from the wild elephant population under the ‘Peace Paper Plan’. A percentage of the profits are still returned to the Foundation, from where its original raw materials came.
To make this beautiful handmade paper, the dung is sun dried and then boiled in a pressurised boiler at 120° to kill any bacteria. Then it is mixed to form a pulp and dyed using salt dyes, before it is put into a mould and submerged in water. When lifted from the mould the paper is put into a press that squeezes the water out and the sheet of paper is then dried naturally in the shade. No tree is cut down to make the paper and no chemicals or acids are used in its production. Making 660 A4 sheets of paper from 10kg of dried dung it provides an environmentally friendly alternative to timber pulp paper.