Outdoors the door to one of many wine retailers in our neighbourhood is a small inconspicuous field. Right here you’ll be able to put your cork stoppers for recycling. We do it. And plenty of French folks additionally, as a result of France is the main cork stopper recycler of the world with round 45 million stoppers handed in and recycled yearly.
Round 10-15 years in the past, the recycling of cork stoppers started in earnest. Since 2018, 550 million corks have been collected worldwide for recycling, based on Amorim, Portugal’s and the world’s largest cork producer. That is, nevertheless, solely a fraction of the round 12 billion cork stoppers used yearly.
Amorim is managing tasks for recycling via numerous collaborations with associations, wine retailers, eating places, wine producers, and so on., in several international locations. From the proceeds from the sale of the recycled corks a portion is donated to charities and different organisations. Over 1.5 million euros have been disbursed to social causes, medical analysis and reforestation.
A number of initiatives in numerous international locations have emerged to encourage cork assortment and recycling. The big British wine retailer chain Majestic has lately began a recycling marketing campaign in all its shops. The intention is to gather a million corks a 12 months. Nicolas, a French wine retailer chain (and supplier of “our” field), has up to now collected 16 million cork stoppers. The cash they bring about in is financing the planting of cork oaks within the southwest of France. 8,000 collected corks correspond to 1 tree planted (we’re in all probability getting near having planted not less than one tree with the corks we’ve dropped within the field; can we maybe get a reputation plate?).
A pile of pure cork pulled out of varied bottles, copyright BKWine Images
BKWine Images
Each producers and shoppers nonetheless love pure cork. However after all, different closures, corresponding to plastic stoppers and screw caps, take market share. However pure cork is environmentally pleasant, and the cork oak forests are price preserving.
The oak tree is an uncommon tree. You should utilize it, “harvest” it, with out reducing it down. You harvest solely the bark, and recent bark will develop instead. You’ll be able to harvest a tree between 15 and 18 occasions throughout its lifetime. A tree will dwell for between 150 and 200 years. Each piece of the bark you harvest is used; there isn’t a wastage; if it isn’t used for cork stoppers it goes into different merchandise. And cork may be recycled eternally.
Harvesting oak bark for cork, Alentejo, Portugal, copyright BKWine Images
BKWine Images
Recycled corks are utilized in numerous merchandise. They can’t, nevertheless, be used to make new cork stoppers. However cork is a cloth with many different makes use of, in building, for insulation, ground coverings, hearth safety, furnishings, footwear, within the automobile business and even for aerospace components. New areas of use are found on a regular basis.
However, after all, an enormous piece of the cork business’s revenues come from wine corks. If the wine business deserted the cork stopper in favour of different closures (which doesn’t appear imminent, I’m glad to say), folks can be much less inclined to take care of the valuable cork oak forests.
The cork oak grows primarily within the western Mediterranean space overlaying in complete over 5.4 million acres. Portugal has probably the most in depth cork oak forest spreading over 1.8 million acres, most in Alentejo within the south. As a comparability, that’s about the identical space as all of the world’s wine-producing vineyards (5.5 Mac) and all of Italy’s vineyards (1.8 Mac) respectively. Portugal can also be the most important processor of cork merchandise, together with cork stoppers. The remaining acreage is in Spain, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, France and Italy.
Harvesting oak bark for cork, Alentejo, Portugal, copyright BKWine Images
BKWine Images
The cork oak is without doubt one of the richest ecosystems on the earth. These forests have an astonishing range of flowers. In Portugal, they supply habitats for a number of endangered animal species, such because the Iberian Lynx and the Iberian imperial eagle. It’s also a vital stopover for migrating birds. The bushes take in carbon dioxide. A cork oak regenerating its bark absorbs on common 5 occasions multiple from which no bark is taken.
In Portugal alone, the CO2 retained by the cork oak forests is the same as 5% of complete CO2 emissions within the nation, based on APCOR, Portugal’s affiliation for cork producers.
The implications can be drastic if the pure cork was to be discontinued on a big scale, says The World Wildlife Fund (WWF). In the long run, this is able to in all probability result in the demise of the cork oak forests. We wouldn’t need that, not least as a result of the cork’s acorns are meals for the little black pigs that run round and finally shall be changed into the perfect dry-cured ham on the earth.
At present, solely 2-3% of all cork stoppers are recycled. We are able to do higher than that. The extra we recycle, the extra extremely valorized this extraordinary and exceptionally sustainable materials shall be.
Learn additionally: Our interview with the CEO of the world’s biggest cork producer, Amorim, together with a video.
—Britt Karlsson
