ENVIRONMENT FRIENDLY BAMBOO

Bamboo has long being regarded as a staple food for the Chinese and Japanese. Now it is gaining newfound popularity and being cultivated widely as cash crop in Europe as well as in the US. Aside from its long established culinary appeal, the revival of Bamboo in the West owes much to its astonishing versatility of being the main ingredient in a dizzy array of applications from floors, mats, mugs, musical instruments to some medical uses.

Bamboo’s environmental value as a natural erosion barrier with its highly compact and intricately tangled root system is also worth mentioning. Bamboo also helps mitigate water pollution due to its high nitrogen consumption, making it the perfect solution for excess nutrient uptake of waste water from manufacturing, intensive livestock farming, and sewage treatment facilities.

There are more than a thousand species of bamboo around the world. Most have relative short growth cycle and can be harvested within 5 years. This is a high yield and highly renewable resource as the usage for the entire crop of bamboos hardly has any wastage.

Bamboo is known to have an infamous cooling effect on top of being an avid oxygen producing agent. A small strand of bamboo can generate enough oxygen to reduce the temperature of a garden by as much as ten degrees.

With the strength that rivals steel and a density that matches those of hardest woods, it is of no surprises that some varieties of bamboo are found to be rot-resistant and require little toxic chemical treatments.

Bamboo also has some medical uses. Secretion from bamboo is used internally to treat asthma, coughs, and can be used as an aphrodisiac. Ingredients from the root help treat kidney disease. Roots and leaves have also been used to treat venereal disease and cancer. Sap is said to reduce fever, and ash will cure prickly heat.