Kirinyaga Governor Anne Waiguru, on Monday, October 28, launched a revolutionary innovation that could crete a new revenue stream from rice husks in the rice-producing county.
Speaking from her Kirinyaga office, the governor proudly explained her successful project which will see her county use the previously discarded rice husks to create school furniture.
"I am happy to report that I received the first prototypes of the panels from the National Environment Trust Fund and gave the go-ahead to develop further variations and begin the commercialization spearheaded by our Kirinyaga Investment Development Authority," she announced.
She went on to explain how her county planned on using the newfound skill to not only enhance Early Childhood Development within her county but generate employment as well.
"This is a major milestone towards the realization of setting up of a fully-fledged rice husks factory in Kirinyaga county run by training our youth," she stated.
The cereal residue has little commercial value but Waiguru announced that she had finally realised her vision to change that.
Kirinyaga is the largest producer of rice in the country, producing over 80,000 tonnes of rice annually, and for every five tons of rice harvested, one ton of husk is produced.
Rice husks are quite fibrous by nature, thereby, requiring little energy input to prepare the husk for board manufacture.
These boards have also been proven to be resistant to attack by termites, wood-boring insects and wood-decaying organisms
"When I came into office, I tasked my team to find a way of utilizing rice husks ( a by-product of rice) in production of panels for making ECD classroom furniture," the governor added.
