Ghana: Wear and tear of books, especially, of children is commonplace.Their enthusiastic and, sometimes, rough reading style leaves many books last below their span.

Government, schools and even parents are compelled as a result to replace them at a huge cost.

There appears to be some relief, however, as the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology moves into printing children’s books with leather.

Nothing can salvage them, and replacement is inevitable. It’s an annual ritual.

The Department of Integrated Rural Art and Industry investigated and experimented the use of leather for children’s books.

Leader of the team championing this, Dr John Osei Bobie told Joy News in an interview that following research, it has been discovered that the most important documents were done on leather.

“We’ve had complaints from teachers and parents of children tearing their books apart, so we wanted to make children’s books with leather as a support.”

Every page is leather and, of course, it comes at a cost, but Dr Osei Bobie says it is cheaper in terms of the years it can last.

“I can say authoritatively this can last ten years and more,” he emphasized.

Leather is susceptible to fungal attack therefore researchers have developed new ways to mitigate the effect in order to maintain the surface value.

This article was 1st published on myjoyonline.com on 12th oct 2017