00:00My name is Olivia Aworokinyi, I'm the co-founder and CEO of Fine Kazi Company Limited.
00:12Our DIY is that we turn waste pineapple leaves into stylish and fashionable shoes.
00:27In Kenya we produce a lot of pineapples, so once the pineapples are harvested, this is
00:34what is usually considered waste and it's usually burnt or chemically decomposed.
00:40Once we get the pineapple leaves from the farm, we come to the sorting centre.
00:47As you can see, the women are separating the leaves and sorting them out before we start
00:54the extraction process.
00:56Across our entire value chain, we work with a lot of women.
01:00As you can see in this process of the sorting, extraction and spinning as well, we are working
01:07with women because we believe women empowerment is very important and this is also part of
01:16SDG number five, which is gender equality.
01:19Our idea started back in 2018 as a school project.
01:24It was actually a design thinking challenge where we were challenged to identify problems
01:31in the society and come up with solutions.
01:35In the process of taking a business trip to Thika, Kenya, we happened to pass along huge
01:43hectares of pineapple plantations and we were able to see huge plantation farms.
01:52But what shocked us the most were a lot of waste leaves piled up alongside the road.
01:58So out of curiosity, when we decided to inquire, that's when we learned that the leaves are
02:04actually considered as waste after the pineapples are harvested.
02:09We had no idea of how we are going to achieve this.
02:14So we literally took the leaves and went to a colleague's backyard and this is how we
02:21were extracting the fibres manually, just to prove that our concept can work.
02:30But it's very tiring and cumbersome as you can see.
02:34After a long and tedious process, we end up with this.
02:39So these are the pineapple fibres after they have been extracted by hand.
02:44But the process is long and tedious.
02:47This is why we work with the women's group to use the machine, because the machine is
02:55more efficient, it saves us a lot of time and it's not as tedious as the manual process.
03:02As you can see, we have been able to extract a lot of fibres from the machine as compared
03:25to the manual process.
03:28What we could have achieved within one hour, we have actually done triple the work and
03:36the quality of the fibres is actually better.
03:39So what we are doing is just checking the quality of the fibres.
03:46After we have extracted and checked the quality of the fibres, we go straight into washing
03:53so that we can get rid of the green colouring matter.
03:58After I dip them in water and wash them, the next step is just drying them under natural
04:06sunlight so that they can be ready for dyeing.
04:11Once we have dried the wet fibres, which look like this, we are able to now obtain the dried
04:18fibres which are in its purest form, no chemicals have been added.
04:23So this is what we now prepare for the dyeing stage.
04:26We are able to dye these fibres with different colours, different dyes, which are all natural
04:35as you can see.
04:37Then for example, these black fibres, we dye them with black natural dye, which we are
04:46able to make these pairs of shoes with as well.
04:51Then after the dyeing process, we spin the fibres into a yarn, which are now woven into
05:00this material.
05:01Once we have the material, we are able to give it to the cobblers who cut different
05:07pattern pieces depending on the design of the shoe.
05:12And after the pattern pieces are cut, they are able to stitch them into stylish and fashionable
05:19shoes like this one.
05:20I encourage the youth in the community to look for waste resources around the community,
05:27whether it's plastic, agro-waste and add value to it, while creating a positive social
05:34impact in the community.
05:36My DIY is to take waste pineapple leaves and convert it into stylish and fashionable shoes.
05:43If I can do it, you can also do it.
05:50Learn more at www.plastics-car.com
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