Paper bares all

After all, this is Wageningen UR. But a toilet paper panel: now that does make our journalistic ears prick up. Sixteen men and women – staff and students – bending in deep concentration over sheets of loo roll. Pulling on them, holding them up to the light and in an unguarded moment even sniffing at them. The paper must bare all its qualities. But it is less of a joke than it may seem, says the aptly named project leader Lisette Schoonman (schoon means clean). The test is part of the tender process for toilet paper and paper towels. A process that has been going on with ups and downs for two years now. We work our way through 400,000 tonnes of this sort of paper per year. Not child’s play. Still a bit surprising that the paper is only tested on the hands…