ORPASETRA

ABSTRACT

                            Plastic materials such as plastics for soil mulching, plastic seedling trays and bags have become a serious problem in terms of biodegradation. According to an estimate, it takes 10 to 20 years for plastics to degrade. Only 9% of plastic waste is recycled, 12% is incinerated, and the remaining 79% end up in landfills and oceans (Condor Ferries, 2021). This motivates the researchers to produce an organic paper seedling tray that would serve as a seed starting container. The developed seedling tray ORPASETRA is made up of Banana Fiber and Sawdust coated with bamboo-based activated carbon. Three (3) treatments were formulated such as T1 (86% of Banana Fiber & 14% of Sawdust), T2 (90% of Banana Fiber & 10% of Sawdust) and T3 (92% of Banana Fiber & 8% of Sawdust). All of the treatments were utilized in the experiment as to its effect in seed germination rate, seedling vigor, container biodegradability and chemical property.

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                           Experimental Research design was applied, wherein the developed trays were labeled T1 (86% of Banana Fiber & 14% of Sawdust), T2(90% of Banana Fiber & 10% of Sawdust), and T3 (92% of Banana Fiber & 8% of Sawdust) and underwent testing at (DOST-FPRDI) for the analysis of the physical properties of basis weight, thickness, burst strength, and tensile strength. Treatment 2 is the best treatment among all the formulations of physical properties in terms of basis weight (146.77g/m2 ), thickness (0.810 mm), burst strength (1.83 kPa.m2g.), and tensile strength (24.41 N.m/gz) T2 also showed an excellent result in terms of seed germination rate, seedling vigor, container biodegradability and chemical property.

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                          Independent T-test was used that resulted to a statistics value (T-stats) 3.80361 wherein, it is beyond than the critical value (T-crit) which is 1.86. Therefore, there is a significant difference between the organic seedling tray and the commercially available containers in terms of the rate of growth.

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                  Overall, treatment 2 is the best formulation among all the treatments with all the parameters conducted and findings showed that Orpasetra is capable of being an alternative to commercial seedling trays.