How 12,000 Tonnes of Dumped Orange Peel Grew Into a Landscape Nobody Expected to Find
24th September 2024
The plan was born in 1997 when Princeton researchers Daniel Janzen and Winnie Hallwachs approached Costa Rican orange juice manufacturer Del Oro with a unique opportunity.
If Del Oro agreed to donate part of its land bordering the Guanacaste Conservation Area to the national park, the company would be allowed to dump its discarded orange peel at no cost on degraded land in the park.
The juice company agreed to the deal, and some 12,000 tonnes of waste orange peel carried by a convoy of 1,000 truckloads was unceremoniously dumped on virtually lifeless soils at the site.
The deluge of nutrient-rich organic waste had an almost instantaneous effect on the fertility of the land.
“[W]ithin about six months the orange peels had been converted from orange peels into this thick black loamy soil,” Treuer told Scientific American.
Win-win, right? Well, not exactly.
Despite this promising start, the conservation experiment wasn’t to last, after a rival juice manufacturer called TicoFruit sued Del Oro, alleging that its competitor had “defiled a national park”.
Costa Rica’s Supreme Court sided with TicoFruit, and the ambitious experiment was forced to end, which saw the site largely forgotten about for the next 15 years.
Reminding us, once again, that government screws up everything it touches.