Until now the COVID-19 pandemic is still ongoing in Indonesia and we as Indonesian citizens must prepare for everything that might happen. This is due to the high number of infection cases in a number of countries, even though many countries have managed to control it. In Indonesia, the number of new infection cases is quite low, at 186 cases, bringing the total to 4,253,598 confirmed infection cases (23 November 2021). Even though the case of COVID-19 in Indonesia has been sloping, we all must not be careless and still have to carry out health protocols and prevent the spread of COVID-19. One way to prevent its spread is to wash your hands with hand soap or handwash.
The handwash used must be able to kill viruses and bacteria on the hands, this makes the student team of Industrial Chemical Engineering Technology Diponegoro University Vocational School chaired by Mahendra Farih Sholawa (TRKI 2019) with team members Rega Ardiansyah (TRKI 2019), Fellanda Harfiana (TRKI 2019) ), and Palupi Diah Utami (TRKI 2019) innovated to make hand wash products from the remaining content in tea dregs and suji leaf extract to overcome waste problems and prevent the spread of COVID-19 with the product name Polytea. Polytea products received funding in the 100 Young Entrepreneurs Program at the Vpkasi School, Diponegoro University. The polytea uses tea dregs as raw material, currently tea dregs are only seen as waste and have not been used optimally, even though it turns out that tea dregs still contain bioactive compounds in the form of flavonoids and tannins as antibacterials that can inhibit bacterial growth and as essential oils that give a distinctive fragrance. , as well as saponins that function to damage cell wall proteins. In addition, to strengthen these substances, suji leaf extract is needed as an anti-bacterial amplifier, preventing free radicals and as a natural green coloring agent that contains a lot of chlorophyll. The reason for using suji leaves is because of the great potential of suji leaves in the environment and many people don’t know it yet, even though suji leaves can be used as an ingredient for making handwashes that are more environmentally friendly.
The method of processing handwash is very easy and the costs used are very economical. The ingredients used in making Polytea are tea dregs extract which is done by maceration method using the best solvents, natural dyes from Suji leaves, NaCl, texapon and aquades. The manufacturing process was previously carried out on a laboratory scale first to determine the quality of this product and in the end Polytea can be produced on a home industrial scale. The method of manufacture is to mix all the ingredients until homogeneous and wait for 2×24 hours to get a polytea solution until it is ready to use. This polytea has passed the organoleptic test stages such as smell, taste, texture, resistance, and color. Then it has been tested for pH, viscosity and density so that it is ready to be packaged and marketed.
This product is sold per bottle of 250 ml at a price of Rp. 13,000. The marketing targets are students, the general public, restaurants, public places, offices, pharmacies, health centers, and hospitals. The turnover obtained can reach 1,399,000/month. In the marketing process, Polytea uses the word of mouth method to the closest people, promotions through social media WhatsApp, Line, Instagram in its selling media. In the next few months Polytea is in the process of being able to enter and compete in the world of e-commerce or startups such as shopee, tokopedia, lazada, and others.
This Polytea handwash is proven to be a deterrent to the Corona virus and bacteria that are abundant in the environment such as Staphylococcus aureus with great inhibition to break the contact of viruses and bacteria in the human body. With this innovation, it is hoped that it can be a solution for handling tea dregs waste, utilizing the local potential of suji leaves, can prevent viruses and bacteria, as a material for health protocols so as to create a healthy society and achieve Indonesia’s sustainable development goals or Sustainable Development Goals number 3, namely Good Health and Well Being.