![](/themes/custom/youngchampions/img/YCOE_logo.svg"){kind=logo}
I am a PhD candidate and verified Dubai Future Research Contributor. I’m also the Chief Technology Officer and Co-Founder at CLEAPL and author of the patent RU No2606990 and patent-pending-RU 2019116397/05. In order to stop greenwashing the population about “biodegradable” plastic bags, in 2017 I spearheaded and developed the national standard of the Russian Federation for biodegradable packaging.
Ivan Zakharov - Russian, Europe
2020 Winner | Entrepreneur | Russian
My company CLEAPL has developed edible and biodegradable straws, cups, laminate and wrapping films from plant by-product materials at the cheapest available market price of 3 €/kg. We have developed the Russian national standard for biodegradable goods and patented and improved the exploitation of native polymers by bio-modifying proteins and polysaccharides with enzymes. Our material is one hundred percent biodegradable under normal environmental conditions, strong, resistant, transparent and has all the properties normally required of plastic. The use of our product reduces a consumer’s carbon footprint by more than 12 times when compared to using plastics of fossil-fuel origin. CLEAPL has received accolades from the Global Food Summit, GenerationS, StartUpBootCamp, FoodTech (Rome) and the Global Innovators Summit (Dubai) amongst many others and has received support and funding from EXPO 2020. Currently, we are organizing the production of straws in Russia and are engaged in the certification of our products from Technischer Überwachungsverein (TÜV).
Disclaimer:
NOTE: This content was shared online for the 2019 cycle of the Young Champions of the Earth programme and has not been updated. This listing does not constitute any endorsement by nor status with the UN Environment Programme.
Previous Regional Winners
Young Champions of the Earth is a forward-looking prize designed to breathe life into the ambitions of brilliant young environmentalists.