Mitsubishi Plastics, Inc. (Head office: Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo; President: Takumi Ubagai) announces its launch of regular sales of Karatto Sheet, a permeable waterproof sheet, on June 20. This product offers easy storage of rice straw and other material used as roughage in livestock production while left outside for drying. Favorable results were obtained in proving tests conducted in 21 prefectures.

  Recent years have seen intensifying needs in the Japanese livestock industry for domestic production of dried rice straw and other types of roughage that is safe and sound, to ensure a stable supply of livestock products. Generally, after harvesting, rice straw that is used for roughage is sun-dried in the field for a few days until its moisture content has been reduced to about 20 percent. It is then rolled and stored in a warehouse. If no warehouse is available, the rolled rice straw is wrapped in a polyethylene stretch film and then stored outside. This practice, however, has certain drawbacks. Besides the shortage of storage warehouses and the extra time and trouble required for wrapping, there have arisen problems such as straw putrefaction and outbreak of mildew when the straw is rolled and stored without being fully dried due to the influence of a protracted rainy season reducing the drying time.

  With the Karatto Sheet developed by Mitsubishi Plastics, farmers pile rolls of rice straw whose moisture content has been reduced by drying outside to about 30 percent on plastic pallets laid on the ground outside. They can then cover the whole pile with the sheet for further drying outdoors. The sheet consists of polyethylene film with micropores sandwiched with non-woven fabric. This structure prevents rain and other moisture from going through the sheet, and yet enables efficient discharge of the water vapor contained in the straw outside, through the sheet. These features make it possible to shorten the time required for sun-drying from the usual five to seven days to about two days. The product therefore will presumably make an effective countermeasure for even long rainy spells. In addition, because it eliminates the need for storage warehouses and wrapping, it will help to reduce labor and costs as compared to conventional methods. There is also an advantage for the quality of dried straw used to feed premium Japanese cattle yielding well-marbled beef. It is known that storage in warehouses for anywhere from six months to a year reduces the beta-carotene contents. Proving tests showed that Karatto Sheet delivered the same effect in just a few months.

  From now on, we are going to promote a campaign of wide-ranging publicity for Karatto Sheet as a product that can make a contribution to farmers nationwide. We intend to achieve an early expansion of this business and are aiming for sales of about 500 million yen in fiscal 2016.

 *Mitsubishi Plastics will exhibit Karatto Sheet at the Biomass Expo held for three days beginning on June 18 (at Tokyo Big Sight; Booth BE-14, East Hall 3). There, we are going to propose a diversity of new applications for it, in areas such as drying and storage of wooden chips used for biomass power generation and construction materials, drying and storage of feed rice as a promising alternative to corn, and phytoremediation.

[Photo: storage using Karatto Sheet]

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[Trend of rice straw moisture and beta-carotene contents]

Mitsubishi Plastics conducted a proving test related to the trend of the moisture and beta-carotene content over a period of about seven months starting on September 5, 2012, in Kagoshima Prefecture. In this test, rice straw (of the Tachiaoba variety) with a moisture content of about 33 percent was covered with Karatto Sheet and stored outdoors. Seven months after the start of the test, the moisture content had been reduced to about 18 percent, and no beta-carotene was detected.

 

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