The Red, White, and Green

Photo: Sustainable Health Enterprises

Warning: If you’re a man who didn’t grow up with sisters, you may be a bit squeamish when it comes to the following topic; but stay with me — this is important stuff.

When trolling the feminine care aisle, most of us give little thought to the matter at hand beyond how to get rid of those cramps and preferred absorbency. Judging by the plethora of plastic out there, the environment isn’t much of a consideration, either, despite the fact that 12 billion pads and tampons are sent to US and Canadian landfills every year. But in developing nations like Rwanda, menstruation is a matter of survival: Millions of girls and women miss up to 50 days of school or work a year because they can’t afford to buy sanitary pads.

One woman, Harvard Business School grad Elizabeth Scharpf, has come up with a way to change all this, and to do it in a way that actually helps the environment: sanitary pads made from trash-bound banana-tree fibers. As if this weren’t amazing enough, Scharpf and her Sustainable Health Enterprises (SHE) organization are working to help Rwandan women set up their own businesses manufacturing these pads. (Farmers benefit, too — they now get paid for those banana-tree fibers that were once thrown out.)

This is world-changing stuff: Scharpf shared the stage with Nobel Prize winner Muhammad Yunus and President Bill Clinton at the Clinton Global Initiative last September.

I came across Scharpf’s story in the February issue of Marie Claire, but that article is not online, unfortunately. Read more about the incredible work Scharpf and her team are doing by visiting the SHE blog.

–Jennifer Grayson

Do this now: The average woman throws away between 10,000 and 15,000 tampons, pads, and applicators over her lifetime. Believe it or not, there are eco-friendly options out there that don’t suck. Keep an open mind, and check out some cool alternatives here.

Related post:
Save water, pee in the shower

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