Call for Action to Stop Printing Calendars and Paper Gifts
While world leaders are getting ready to travel to Baku (the capital of the Republic of Azerbaijan) to attend COP 29 in November 2024 to act for a sustainable future and talk on issues that have waste implications such as energy, agriculture, food, urbanisation, and so forth, the role of paper waste and its costs to humankind should not be overlooked. Research shows that there are two main costs that people bear while wasting paper. The first is environmental costs: deforestation, the use of enormous amounts of energy and water, as well as air pollution and waste pollution affecting people’s health and economy. Research shows that 93% of paper production comes from trees. As of late January 2024, more than 2 million hectares (ha) of forests have been cut down. This means, according to my rough estimation, that if the tree-cutting trend continues apace, 24 million hectares of forests will be extinguished by the end of this year alone, whereas the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimates that 10 million ha of forest have been cut down each year. We should also consider the following. We know that “from 2001 to 2019, a total of 386 million ha of forest were lost globally (in all forest types combined). This loss represents an almost 10% decrease in tree cover since 2000. 42% of all global wood harvest is used to make paper.” We also know that cardboard and paper emit 0.94 kg of carbon emissions per 1kg of packaging. Moreover, we know that when paper corrodes, it emits methane gas, which is 25 times more toxic than CO2. Furthermore, papermaking is not an energy-saving process. The electricity consumption in paper production is 209.2228 KWh , which is higher than that of plastic production. “According to the Environmental Paper Network’s Paper Calculator of 2013, it takes about 32 million BTUs [British thermal units] of energy to produce 1 tonne of virgin paper bar.” Water use is another issue in the paper-making process. Research indicates that “plants may use as much as 300 to 400 kg or litres of water to make 1 kg of paper.” Finally, as a waste pollutant, paper accounts for around 26% of total landfill waste and 33% of municipal waste.In addition to the environmental costs associated with the paper-making process, there is the financial one. That’s why using paper inefficiently at the workplace demands serious attention. The following findings from productivity research studies indicate:Inefficient use of printers, copiers, and fax machines can waste between 1 and 3 percent of company revenue annually.For every dollar spent on copying, companies incur another $6 in handling and distribution, and half of all documents printed are thrown away within 24 hours.An average of 17 percent of everything printed is considered waste.Researchers estimate that every tree produces enough oxygen for three people to breathe. As one prominent expert has written, “one acre [4,047 square meters] of trees annually consumes the amount of carbon dioxide equivalent to that produced by driving an average car for 26,000 miles [41.8 km]. That same acre of trees also produces enough oxygen for 18 people to breathe for a year.” So why would we kill our life-saving trees, bear high financial costs, and pollute the environment?Under COP 27, which was hosted in Egypt and marked the 30th anniversary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change of 1992, the concept of Zero Waste Hierarchy was introduced for waste prevention as a form of climate change mitigation. Chart 1 describes the concept of the Hierarchy. It shows that “According to the waste hierarchy, prevention is the most preferable option in waste management, as waste is not produced in the first place , and the environmental impacts that come with trying to find a suitable destination for waste are avoided. Over 70% of global GHG emissions come from the material economy, all the way from extraction to disposal. It is therefore a climate imperative that waste prevention is a primary focus.”On this basis, we urge companies:to stop printing notebooks and calendars as gifts!to reuse office printed paper, which will reduce paper waste by 50% ! to rethink packaging solutions and recycle papers to reduce the impact of producing new packages or new documents. This will significantly reduce landfills and municipal waste! Recycling one tonne of paper can save up to 17 trees and uses only half as much water; it uses only 12,000 gallons of water instead of the 24,000 gallons [90849.883 litres] that producing new paper does.to redesign archiving documents and use electronic instead of paper documents! to sustain livelihoods, the environment, and the economy!
