Green paper mills see sales boost

Although many paper producers faced record losses and mill closures in 2007, green paper mills fared well with increased sales and market access.

One mill, Cascades Fine Paper, saw a 235% jump in the sales of their 100% recycled paper. Sales for Domtar Inc's FSC paper doubled from 2006 to 2007.More than 520 Canadian book publishers, magazines, newspapers and printers now have Ancient Forest FriendlyTM or eco-paper purchasing policies in place, up from 172 publishers, printers and magazines at the beginning of 2007.

The change represents a 300% increase. Meeting this increased market, seventeen additional eco-papers were available to publishers in 2007.

Ancient Forest Friendly is a Markets Initiative program which encourages Canadian publishing companies to use recycled paper or paper from sustainable growing operations.

Market Initiatives also found these environmental initiatives-including printing publications on recycled paper-are greatly supported by Canadian consumers.

Ninety five per cent of Canadians say an environmental policy and progress toward meeting its targets are important benchmarks of a publishing company's environmental integrity.

"The only bright light for the paper industry this past year has been a green light," said Nicole Rycroft, executive director of Markets Initiative.

"The forestry and paper industries are often deemed to lack innovation, but with green product demand rising as it is, there are a number of Canadian mills already benefiting from environmental innovation.

This is good news for the climate and Canada's Boreal Forest."She added while environmental leadership has been strong companies must make concrete environmental actions to gain consumer trust.

Despite the good news for the green paper industry, the report cautioned that the publishing industry contains a large amount of green washing that consumers should look out for.

The report found 78 per cent of Canadians believe companies are marketing themselves to be greener than they really are in practice.

The report noted recent examples of companies overstating their environmental actions, including US magazines that have run 'green' issues on 100% virgin paper, including Vanity Fair and Elle US, while Nippon Paper Group and Oji Paper Co., Japan's largest paper producers, have been caught in a green marketing scandal.

In January of 2008 Nippon Paper Group admitted it had falsified a claim about the quantity of recovered fibre in a number of its paper products.

Oji Paper admitted to claiming that the amount of recycled paper in its copy and printing paper was 50 per cent, when in fact it was between 5 to 10 per cent.

The report suggested that publishers building green brands not to underestimate the ramifications of greenwashing to an increasingly informed and savvy consumer base.

About Market Initiatives

Markets Initiative works with Canadian publishing and printing companies to conserve ancient and endangered forests by shifting their demand and supply of paper products to environmentally sound options. Markets Initiative works through the entire supply chain, facilitating new product development as necessary.

This article is reproduced with kind permission of The GLOBE Foundation of Canada.

It was originally published in GLOBE-Net, the On-line Guide to the Business of the Environment published by the GLOBE Foundation.

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