US prisoners to make their own toilet paper

LONDON - Prisoners in the US state of Iowa could soon be making their own toilet paper, in what officials describe as a bid to save taxpayers money.

Under the plan, state prisons would buy one-tonne rolls of paper from a mill, then process it into single rolls, so as to save up to 100,000 dollars a year.

According to the Des Moines Register, prison official Al Reiter, an associate warden at Anamosa Prison, said the toilet paper was “not nice and fluffy”, but acceptable.

“If you looked at this stuff and compared it to the toilet paper that you buy in the store, you would say, ‘Boy, this doesn’t look very good’,” the BBC quoted Reiter as saying.

“It’s not nice and fluffy, but the state is saying that this is an acceptable roll of toilet paper,” he added.

The director of Iowa Prison Industries, the prisoner work arm of the Iowa correction system, said the state legislature would need to approve the idea when it convenes next month.

“Our challenge is to seek out new things that we can do, and, well, toilet tissue is a high-consumption item,” Roger Baysden stated.

Iowa prisoners already make and sell everything from furniture and clothing to carved wooden toys. (ANI)