By Mark Rushton, Editor, Pulp & Paper International Magazine, RISI
BRUSSELS,
April 28, 2009
(Viewpoint) -
Just before the global crisis took center stage in all our lives, the big subject was environmental sustainability - especially in an industry such as pulp and paper. But don’t think for one minute that the subject has been buried under the current worldwide economic woes; in fact, if anything, green issues are going to emerge once again onto center stage with even more force and ferocity in the future as big banks and institutions look to something more stable, ethical and ecological to invest in – and what a better alternative forests are to dubious subprime mortgages and mass risky lending. In fact, forests worldwide are being thought of as the new "green gold", and even the new "green oil".
But even before the economic crisis, large finance houses were beginning to show a healthy interest in large tracts of forest, for instance Merrill Lynch and its proposed plan to put money into preserving a large area of forest in the Indonesian province of Aceh for the purpose of "selling carbon credits as well as aiming to stop illegal logging". There are also many more big plans from finance houses in the offing in, for instance, Brazil.
But it is not just big money; the subject of global forestry is really beginning to hot up within other organizations as well. The UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) recently stated that up to 10 million new jobs could be created by national investments in sustainable forestry management. Jan Heino, assistant director general of the FAO’s Forestry Department, says: "As more jobs are lost due to the current economic downturn, forest management could be a means of creating millions of jobs". The FAO went on to state that the new jobs worldwide would be in the agro-forestry and farm industry, improved fire management, development and management of trails and recreation sites, expansion of urban green space, restoring of degraded forests and planting new ones.
Changes in approach to sustainability needed
Ambassador Alan Oxley, the head of another organization, World Growth, agrees that forest management could be one of the key factors in reducing both climate change emissions and poverty. The World Growth organization has been set up to specifically address poverty issues in third world countries, and Oxley is adamant that the way things have been done in the past and at present are not conducive to overall sustainability. Speaking exclusively to PPI, Oxley says: "Today, sustainability in commercial forestry is generally measured by application of the standards set in PEFC, FSC and similar nationally-based programs. It is not necessarily the best solution to argue these systems should be applied across the board in developing countries. These are world’s best practice quality systems from advanced economies that depend on the sort of advanced policy infrastructure common in advanced economies. In poorer economies without comparable supporting infrastructure, these systems might be costly and bring commercial forestry to a halt. They may be useable by large companies with international exposure, but insisting on adoption of those systems across the board for smaller locally based enterprises would entail a loss or economic activity which should be regarded unconscionable. Clearly something needs to be developed which is suitable for lower income developing economies".
Certification – successes, but are they the answer?
In most developed countries though, and certainly in Europe, the promotion of forest certification issues have had a huge impact on the pulp and paper industry, as well as related industries down the line, for example printing and packaging. The most well known certification standards, PEFC and FSC, are now household acronyms, and end users are now asking for them by name when they put an order in.
In the UK the drive for recognition of certification has been particularly successful with 1,000 printers now having the PEFC chain of custody and well over 500 signing up to the FSC, and a lot of print and packaging producers have both. But all is not completely well on the front line when trying to get the message over to printers’ customers. At the recent launch of the British Printing Federation’s (BPIF) Carbon Calculator - a facility for printers to calculate a print job’s carbon footprint - there were some audible grumblings. Richard Owers, commercial director of Beacon Press, a UK company known worldwide for its environmental credentials, said: "We as a company have been at the forefront of moving environmental print into the mainstream. One of the main confusions in this area is what we call the `accreditation crunch’. There are so many different standards and logos that it is confusing for printers when specifying paper. For instance take FSC and PEFC. Printers would be much happier if there was one overall label. It would make our lives much easier".
Pulp and paper makers have also taken on board the certification schemes, although there was some resistance at first to signing up to FSC, simply because of the cost of auditing and it not suiting smaller tracts of managed forests. But as things have progressed, and as the FSC has increased its branding among the consumers, most European producers have signed up to both. Södra Cell is the latest pulp producer moving to adopt the scheme. Per Braconier, the company’s communication director says: "In some of our markets demand for FSC certified products and a preference for FSC above other certification systems has grown significantly. We need to respond to these demands and give our customers what they want otherwise they will go elsewhere. We want to, and have to, offer our customers FSC certified grades to enable them to meet consumers needs otherwise we risk losing orders".
An environmentalist’s point of view
So, how is the industry health in general on the sustainability front? Environmentalist, and UPM’s director of regional environmental affairs in the UK, John Sanderson, is complimentary of the work the paper industry is carrying out on the sustainability front, but admits there is still a lot of work to be done. He says: "In general, the industry as a whole has made great progress, and is second to none as an industry in showing what can be done, but there is still a long way it could go. Successes so far have been two fold; demonstrating sustainability in the area of fiber, both in the use of recovered material and in the area of using sustainable and certified virgin fiber, and in the production processes which have been totally transformed over the years. You only have to look at the improvement in effluent quality that is now, in most mills, comparable to the quality of the water being taken out.
"When it comes to certification issues, there is a misconception that pulp and paper companies "promote" one or other of the certification schemes, we need to divorce ourselves from this way of thinking. UPM’s line is that it promotes good forest practice, no matter what scheme or label it is under, as long as it adheres to our criteria, and the ones set by the Helsinki and Montreal processes.
"The market generally is prone to confusion over certification and sometimes accusations fly around about the supporting of one scheme over another," adds Sanderson. "At UPM, sustainable sources of our wood fiber are of paramount importance, and we source from PEFC, FSC, CSA and SFI as well as other schemes. Around 70% of UPM’s wood comes from certified sources, and the rest comes from countries where there is no certification in place, but we make absolute certain that same criteria applies to those sources. The fact is that only 11% of the world’s forests are certified it doesn’t mean that the rest are managed unsustainably.
"The truth is, certification on a worldwide basis is not the answer to forest protection, it is merely a tool for demonstration purposes. Certification at the papermakers end is proof that we have done our work and put methods in place for demonstrating sustainability".
On other improvements in sustainability, Sanderson says: "We really need to be working on energy, both in consumption and efficient usage. At the moment around 70% of the carbon footprint in papermaking comes from the use of fossil fuels in the production process. Transport is only a minor user of fossil fuels. So we need to look at ways of reducing energy, by for instance changing the pulp from mechanical to recovered stock, and then looking at the efficiency of the machines, for example changing the type of pump or motor we use.
"But most importantly, we need to look at the source of the fuels we are using. UPM has invested close to Euro 500 million over the last few years in the area of renewable fuels. One of our investments coming on stream later this year is the Targe Project, a 90-MW thermal biomass fuelled CHP plant at our Caledonian mill in Scotland. Once up and running it will produce all the steam and power for the mill and thereby reducing the carbon footprint of each tonne of paper by one third, that’s 300 kg/tonne. Those are the areas we see as important in sustainability in the future."
Two sides to every story
Clearly, the pulp and paper industry has a good environmental story to tell, and there is some good news: finally a vehicle has emerged on which to get the message across. A new initiative was formed last year in the UK and is now being rolled out across Europe. Called Two Sides, the campaign has been set up to dispel negative myths associated with the pulp, paper and printing industries. Martin Eustace, the campaign leader of the initiative says: "Environmental concerns have moved to the top of almost every agenda in recent years, and have an increasing influence over the decisions we make every day. As the environmental debate has gathered momentum, so have the myths and misconceptions suggesting that the paper industry is responsible for mass deforestation and has an adverse impact on the environment.
"Two Sides is an initiative formed by companies from the graphic communications supply chain including forestry, pulp, paper, inks and chemicals, pre press, press, publishing and printing," Eustace adds. The campaign seeks to dispel common environmental misconceptions surrounding print and paper whilst encouraging its responsible use; also providing paper users with factual information enabling print and paper to remain the preferred, environmentally sustainable, communications medium." To find out more about the Two Sides campaign, visit http://www.twosides.info
The campaign is supported by a well known environmentalist in the UK, Jonathan Porritt, who says of pulp and paper: "There aren’t many industries around that can aspire to becoming genuinely sustainable. The paper industry, however, is one of them, it is inherently sustainable."
There is undoubtedly going to be a lot of activity ahead in worldwide forestry, and certification issues are going to be under scrutiny like never before, especially as big money wades in. For developed countries though, pulp and paper companies should pat themselves on the back for coming up to scratch on the environmental front – there is still plenty of work to do, but as long as the message gets out in a sincere and factual fashion, there is no reason to believe that the rewards for the industry and its future won’t follow.
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