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Excessive
paper consumption: The impacts of injustice
In the world of today, many
millions of people’s level of consumption does not even cover
their basic needs. In plain language, these are millions of people
– mostly children – suffering from hunger and misery. On the other
hand, there are also millions of people – although much fewer
– who consume too much, without this meaning that their basic
needs – as human beings – are thus satisfied.
The result of this situation
is not only an unjust world – which of course it is – but a world
that is moving straight towards environmental disaster. Not precisely
because of those who consume too little, but because of those
who consume in excess. Although this is applicable to practically
any product – from oil to shrimps – the consumption of paper and
paperboard serves to exemplify the problem.
The annual per capita world
consumption of paper and paperboard amounted to 52 kilos in 2004
(1). As with all averages, this hides the disproportion between
the big consumers and the small ones. In fact, citizens
of the so-called “developed” countries consumed an average of
175 kilos per person, while those from the so-called “developing
countries” consumed a scant 20 kilos. These averages also
conceal the fact that in some countries of the North consumption
is well above the average -such as in the cases of Finland (334
kgs), the United States (312) and Japan (250)- as well as the
fact that a supposedly “low” consumption of 20 kilos may be perfectly
adequate to cover basic needs for paper.
The issue at stake is that
this excessive consumption generates serious negative impacts
on the life of millions of people in the South. Paper and paperboard
are made from pulp, and timber is needed to produce it. Increasingly
pulp comes from enormous monoculture plantations, particularly
pine, eucalyptus and acacia trees.
These monoculture tree plantations
are established in regions fulfilling various conditions: rapid
tree growth, access to vast areas of cheap and fertile land, low
labour costs, availability of State subsidies and support, and
scant environmental monitoring. Basically: the South.
The result is the same country
after country: land falling into the hands of large and foreign
corporate landowners, concentration of power, eviction of the
rural population, net loss of jobs on a local level, depletion
of soil and water resources, loss of biodiversity. Despite the
promises of “development” accompanying plantations, the impacts
only worsen as the area under plantation grows. This is easy to
see in countries with millions of hectares of plantations such
as South Africa, Brazil, Chile and Indonesia.
The problem becomes even more
serious when mills producing pulp for export are established near
the plantation areas with the consequent social and environmental
impacts. Aracruz and Veracel in Brasil, Arauco in Chile and Argentina,
Sappi and Mondi in South Africa and Swaziland, Advance Agro in
Thailand, Asia Pulp and Paper in Indonesia are well-known examples
of the serious negative impacts of this industry.
And all for what purpose? So
that the paper industry can have abundant and cheap pulp to continue
expanding its markets and increasing its profits with the permanent
invention of new “needs.”
The result – in particular
in the North but increasingly replicated in the South – is the
imposition of an excessive consumption of paper. Examples are
abundant. An astonishing number of paper and cardboard throw away
items such as drinking cups, plates, trays, napkins and even tablecloths
are replacing – on a massive level- similar lasting articles.
It is now usual when you purchase something - a toy, a watch,
a pair of shoes – for it to come wrapped in paper, in a cardboard
box and handed over to the buyer in a paper bag. People’s homes
are invaded every morning by non-requested correspondence consisting
of advertisements printed on paper. Finally, everyone is forced
to consume a daily dose of paper and paperboard that no-one ever
asked for or wished to consume.
The issue therefore goes beyond
the responsibility of the individual consumer and is framed in
the wider context of the consumer society. Therefore, simply putting
the blame on the individual cannot solve it; it is an issue that
must be addressed at the level of society as a whole.
At this stage the societies
of the North must understand that their life style – in which
consumption occupies an exaggerated position – is affecting the
possibilities for subsistence of people with the same rights in
other parts of the world. They must also understand that this
excessive consumption is leading the planet towards environmental
disaster, which is already evident in climate change, water depletion
and pollution and loss of biodiversity, among others.
The excessive and unnecessary
use of paper and cardboard is only one example of many others
but it may serve to trigger off the necessary debate – particularly
in the North – regarding the limits that should be placed on consumption
and identify mechanisms to bring this about. The wise words of
Gandhi “There is enough in the world for everybody's need, but
not enough for anybody's greed" may serve to illuminate such
a debate.
(1) World Resources Institute.-
Resource Consumption: Paper and paperboard consumption per capita
http://earthtrends.wri.org/searchable_db/index.php?theme=9&variable_I
D=573&action=select_countries
