Science meets Marketing

Consider the biodegradable, disposable Moscardino spork designed by Giulio Iacchetti and Matteo Ragni. Produced by Pandora Design in Italy, this sexy little spork was awarded the prestigious Italian Compasso d'Oro in 2001. They're small enough for easy use by children and grand for picnics and brown bag lunches. The sporks are made of Mater-Bi, a completely biodegradable starch-based plastic, which stands up to repeated use and prolonged contact with liquids, achieving 90 percent degradation in about 50 days under normal aerobic composting conditions. Thus, the spork helps conserve petroleum resources, reduces greenhouse emissions* and creates no waste and no long-term disposal problem.

*The plants grown to produce starch use carbon dioxide from the air to produce oxygen by photosynthesis. When the plastic from the starch decays, carbon dioxide is released, but this is equivalent to the amount the plant used up originally, so the net gain of carbon dioxide is zero.