Italian Group Ilsa has set up a nitrogenated organic fertiliser factory in the town of Portão, in Rio Grande do Sul. The idea behind this came up during a Brazilian trade visit to the company in Italy last year when the large amount of leather waste produced in Brazil attracted Ilsa's attention.

The raw material used by Ilsa is leather waste that is currently sent to landfill sites, which has been a concern for both tanners and environmental authorities for some time because of the amount the country produces. Rio Grande do Sul alone produces 35,000 of waste each year. However, more than half of this is likely to be processed by the Italian company, which has already started contacting potential suppliers.

Ilsa's technology enables waste to be hydrolised in special reactors in a controlled environment at high temperatures and at high pressure which turns it into a jelly. The jelly then undergoes a drying process at controlled temperatures which stabilises it and after that it is sieved to produce the fertiliser in various granulometries and is ready to be sold. The process uses no chemicals.

The name of the fertiliser that will be produced in Brazil is Fertorganico. It is rich in protein-origin nitrogen.

Ilsa has 50 years' experience of producing organic fertiliser from leather waste in Italy. It operates three factories which, between them, produce 34,000 tonnes of organic fertiliser and 62 tonnes of organic mineral fertiliser per year. The fertiliser is shipped to more than 30 countries across the globe.

The Brazilian unit has the capacity to produce 20,000 tons of organic fertiliser per year. Its total output will be exported to Europe because the technology used has not yet been regulated by Brazil's environmental bodies.

“The price of each tonne of leather residue will be set depending on quality, quantity and density,” Viviane Diogo, director of Ilsa Brasil, has said. “It is the type of fertiliser most widely used in Europe, mainly by those that practise biological agriculture.”

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