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Plastic drinking straws litter the countryside and can choke animals that try
to eat them—but Young Kim of Seoul has come up with an answer (WO
99/66808). Starch dough is kneaded, aged and forced through an extruder by a
screw press to produce a long tube. Warm air blows through the tube until the
straw is dry enough to prevent collapse. Then the tube is chopped up into
drinking straw lengths. People can eat them once they’ve finished them, or drop
them on the ground where they become food for animals or natural fertiliser.