Reed Stalk

D. J. Reed, Stalking the Elusive Financial Case for Corporate Sustainability, World Resources Institute, Washington, DC, 2001. 

Chapters 2-10 discuss in detail the different properties of natural lignocellulosic fibers, their processing and fabrication of polymer composites. Chapter 11 summarizes the structure, chemistry and properties of different agro-residual fibers such as wheat straw corn stalk, cob and husks okra stem banana stem, leaf, bxmch reed stalk nettle pineapple leaf sugarcane oil palm bunch and coconut husk along with their processing. 

Some of these agricultural byproducts which have been the subject of research efforts as fiber sources are corn husks rice and wheat straws corn, okra, cotton and reed stalks empty banana bunches pineapple and oil palm leaves and sugarcanes [5,7,10,13,16]. 

Other important fibre sources include flax shaves, bamboo, papyrus, and reed stalks. There are two varieties of flax one is for fibre and the other is for linseed oil production. Bamboo is an important source of raw material for fibreboards in tropical countries. Most varieties of bamboo are fast-growing and produce strong fibres particleboards have also been made from bamboo. 

Retting time depends on the plant species. While okra bast fibers can be obtained after a duration of 15 - 30 days [14,22] it takes several months to extract fibers from corn husk by water retting [13]. The author has not been able to extract fibers from reed leaves and stalks even after two years of immersion in water tanks. 

There are several different classifications in terms of plant fibers. While the classification of Nishino [59] includes seven groups as bast (soft) fibers (flax, hemp, jute), leaf (hard) fibers (sisal, abaca, pineapple, etc.), stem fibers (bamboo, banana stalk, corn stalk), fruit fibers (coconut), seed fibers (cotton, baobab, kapok), straw fibers (rice, wheat, corn), and others (seaweeds, palm), that of Faruk et al. [3] has six groups bast fibers (jute, flax, hemp), leaf fibers (abaca, sisal and pineapple), seed fibers (coir, cotton and kapok), core fibers (kenaf, hemp and jute), grass and reed fibers (wheat, corn and rice) and all other types (wood and roots). 

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