The green market has always faced a lot of controversies.  Most enterprises are facing great challenges in product cost, environmental protection, and user experience. When there is a huge price gap between non-biodegradable and biodegradable materials, sufficient “business opportunities” appear in the intermediate zone.  

"Pseudo degradation" and "Conditional degradation"

In the market, we see a lot of biodegradable plastics in the broad sense. The typical types of biodegradable plastics are PLA and PBAT. Then it should be the mechanically split plastics. However, the truth of degradation actually lies behind these mechanically splitting plastics. And, starch filling, light degradation, and oxidative degradation are members that rank in "pseudo-degradable" plastics.

For example, starch filling means adding in a certain percentage of starch. Through starch biodegradation, the material’s physical properties will be collapsed. The decomposed materials like PE, PP, PVC cannot be absorbed by the environment. Also, they are invisible to naked eyes. They will remain in the environment all the time which will cause greater hazards.  

In addition, many photodegradable plastics actually only add photosensitizers to the material, so that it can be turned into smaller powders under illumination.

In the European Union, the United States, and other developed countries, such products have already been recognized as obsolete products.

Compared with these "pseudo-degradable" products, PLA, PBAT, and other materials are able to become more pure degradable materials theoretically. However, in practice, it may still not meet our expectations.  

In IDTehEx’s research report <Bioplastics 2020-2025>, one of the examples is PLA that “if a PLA bottle is thrown into the sea, it would take hundreds of years to decompose it”. As pointed out in the report, “PLA will be decomposed in industrial composting facilities, where PLA can be heated to a high enough temperature for microorganisms to decompose at a considerable rate."

So, biodegradable plastics represented by PLA and other materials seem good at the surface. Still, there are many insurmountable obstacles at this stage.

Adhere to environmental protection materials, there is a long way to go

Although the ban on plastic products has been implemented worldwide, the implementation is difficult for most enterprises taking various factors into consideration. From plastic development to plastic prohibition, this indicates the contradictions in the pursuit of different values in the human civilization process. It is this contradiction that drives us to think about better solutions.

That's the original aspiration of Yizhi. We dedicate to help sustain a beautiful world and reduce pollution. Also, we hope that this insistence in environment appeals to attract more people so that this limited effort can turn to be unlimited. Product quality is the core of our enterprise development. From raw material procurement to the control of the entire production process, we strive to achieve a higher standard in the industry.

We use biodegradable pulp paper within food grade. Each and every straw and pair of cutlery represents our attitudes towards environmental protection. We restore the environment-friendly essence of products, polish the quality of products and refine the texture sense of products so that every Yizhi consumer not only gets satisfied with the product functions but also to be more attached with environmental protection.