A STATE environment agency has found a novel way to dispose of unwanted alien trees - by turning them into coffins and burying them six feet (1.8m) under.
The World Bank has been so impressed by the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry's idea that it has donated R1-million to the government's Working for Water programme to turn it into reality.
The department has already set up a pilot team of carpenters from a rural community outside Bergville, in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands, to make the first coffins.
The 10-man team, known as Thuthukani Sisebenze, has spent the past four weeks training on chipboard.
In the next few days the group will graduate to pine - one of the alien species that the government is removing from the environment in a countrywide clearing programme.
Group leader Brian Xhala said the project represented a big opportunity for the team members, who would otherwise have no jobs.
"We will sell our coffins to local government for paupers' funerals and we are also speaking to communities through faith-based organisations," said Xhala.
"We will also target funeral companies in the area who don't manufacture their own coffins."
Although their workshop is a ramshackle hut and their tools are few, the carpenters will receive part of the World Bank grant to improve their lot.
The money, which will also help other community organisations start coffin-making projects, will be distributed by Working for Water as part of government efforts to remove invasive alien plants from as many as 10 million hectares.
Working for Water project co-ordinator Shaun Cozett says the aim is to produce cheap but good-quality coffins using the wood from felled trees.
"Environmentally, it makes sense to remove these trees and now we can say we have an economic use for it. We were sitting with this massive opportunity, with all this unwanted timber lying around," he said.
Cozett says calculations indicate that the coffins could retail for about R500, about 20% of the going rate.
Dr Kathy MacKinnon, the lead biodiversity specialist at the World Bank, praised the project for its environmental awareness and "for its commitment to addressing the plight of the poor".