Despite growing public awareness of the need for environmental sustainability, a local distributor of biodegradable bags says it is difficult to find customers.

In 2006, the Friends of the Environment Fund (DML), an NGO, became a local distributor of "the Bio Bag", a biodegradable plastic bag that contains 20 percent cassava.

The bag is said to decompose within three years, while most plastic bags require between 500 and 1,000 years to biodegrade.

This April, the 25-year-old NGO introduced another biodegradable plastic product called Ecoplas, a plastic bag made from 50 percent cassava that decomposes within three months to a year.

"Our main targets are businesses, such as factories and retailers, because they're the main producers of plastic waste," Friends of the Environment Fund resources manager Eko Junaedy said recently.

"However, we're still way below our target," Eko added.

"Most of our customers are not businesses, but community organizations that have environmental concerns or that hold events on behalf of the environment," he said.

"Food producers cannot use biodegradable plastic bags for product packaging because the bags have not yet passed the food grade standard," said Maryanto, a program officer at DML.

Both Ecoplas and the Bio Bag were a combination of plastic and inedible cassava popularly grown in villages in Java and Lampung, he added. They are not recommended for carrying food.

According to Eko, the chemical combination, produced by PT Bio Indoplus in Tangerang, was patented by the company under the name biodegradable resin BE+.

"Further research is needed to make the Bio Bag and Ecoplas more suitable for the food grade standard," Maryanto said.

Biodegradable bags still cost more than common plastic bags, he added.

For example, a pack of 15-centimeter-wide Bio Bags costs Rp 1,500, compared to a pack of plastic bags of the same size, which normally costs between Rp 800 and Rp 1,000.

Ecoplas costs between Rp 42,000 and Rp 60,000 per pack depending on the size.

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