Fallen trees translate to good charcoal business

As the saying goes, one man’s trash is another man’s treasure.

While fallen trees have been a major problem to the government and people since Typhoon Soudelor’s massive destruction, they have been a boon to the island’s charcoal manufacturers.

Charcoal manufacturers have been helping the government and people clear up roads and pathways of toppled trees, while making good business out of it.

MDA Enterprises operations manager Farhanul Islam Tonmoy arranges yesterday the cut tangan-tangan and ironwood trees that they just picked up from roads and other areas on the island after Typhoon Soudelor. The gathered wood are made into charcoal to supply hotels and stores. (Ferdie de la Torre)

In an interview with Saipan Tribune yesterday, Farhanul Islam Tonmoy, 28, operations manager of MDA Enterprises, said before Soudelor, they had to go around the island for areas with tangan-tangan and ironwood or pine trees.

Tonmoy said they would either buy the trees from the land owners or get them for free in exchange for clearing their lands.

“Now it’s easy because of the typhoon. You just pick them up from the roads and other places,” said Tonmoy.

Clearing up a farm or an area of tangan-tangan trees and transporting them usually take them one to two days.

He explained that tangan-tangan trees are the best choice for making charcoal because they don’t produce much smoke and do not leave a bad smell on the barbecue.

He said the second best are ironwood trees because they are big, hard, and also do not produce too much smoke.

After cutting the trees, they would bring them to a container and burn them, a process that would take two days. They would then wait for four more days to cool down everything, after which they now have charcoal to sell.

Before Soudelor, the whole process to make charcoal—starting from the cutting trees to the cool down period—would take them 10 days, Tonmoy said.

After Soudelor, since there are a lot of downed trees, the process takes them just eight days.

It would take about 15 pickups of tangan-tangan or ironwood trees to fill up one container and this will produce 300 bags of charcoal. Each bag of charcoal costs $5.

There are about five charcoal manufacturers on the island.

Tonmoy said their company has been in business for 15 years now and is the oldest among on island manufacturers.

Tonmoy said their company produces charcoal three to four times a month, while others could only make once or twice a month.

“It’s hard to make charcoal. It requires hard labor and it’s hot,” he said.

He said with lots of downed trees, they may be able to produce more charcoal than usual.

Manufacturers make charcoal in secluded areas to avoid complaints about smoke from neighbors.

Tonmoy said landowners would generally either call or look for them to have their lands cleared of trees so they could either build a structure or plant.

He said before cutting trees, they have to check first whether the landowners have all the necessary permits.

The next thing they do, Tonmoy said, is check the farm whether it has endangered bird species like nightingale reed-warblers because they don’t want to violate federal laws.

Although Soudelor struck the island between Aug. 2 and 3, Tonmoy said they only started picking up fallen tangan-tangan and ironwood trees six days later because he and his co-workers were also affected by the typhoon.

He said their container, located in Finasisu, was also damaged.

Tonmoy said charcoal is good business on the island because there’s an abundance of tangan-tangan and ironwood trees.

He said the demand is also sufficient because local people like to barbecue while tourists like to eat barbecued food.

Tonmoy said their company has been supplying charcoal to hotels and stores.

While they currently don’t have a problem with their wood supply, Tonmoy said that a lot of thieves have been stealing their chainsaws and bags of charcoal from their warehouse.