Shrink Paper is a project of the European Environmental Paper Network, sister network to the Environmental Paper Network in North America, and with links all around the world. Together we have a Common Vision for Transforming the Pulp and Paper Industry. We believe this industry can be ethical and sustainable, but it isn’t there yet. We also believe that as consumers, we all have a responsibility not to be wasteful with this valuable material.
Since the 1960s, world consumption of paper has quadrupled and use of printing paper has increased six-fold. Just 10% of the world’s population (western Europe and north America) consumes more than 50% of the world’s paper. Europeans and Americans use 6 times as much paper as the world average.
Yet much of this paper use is wasteful and unnecessary and some of it is linked to human rights abuses, forest destruction, pollution and climate change emissions. Our paper consumption is the major driver of the forestry industry: half of the trees cut commercially around the world end up in paper products.
Paper use has increased most in the computer age despite technological advances like electronic communication, which should offer good alternatives. A staggering 45% of office-printouts end up in the bin by the end of the day they are printed: this isn’t just a waste of trees, it’s a huge waste of money.
It’s also unfair. The average European uses more paper in a day than people in poor countries get access to each year. If we want the many benefits of paper – books and education, information sharing and democracy, sanitation and safe food – to be available to everyone in the world without increasing production to unsustainable levels, it is up to people in wealthy societies to reduce wasteful paper use.
Reducing consumption of paper in Europe is a key priority of the European Environmental Paper Network. More that 50 non-governmental organisations, who make up the network, agreed this when we signed our common vision in 2006, and we reaffirmed this at our meeting in Portugal in 2012. We do not advocate the use of alternative materials to paper, unless they are proven to have a smaller ecological footprint, and we encourage all paper users to work towards all the goals in our vision.
The purpose of our Shrinkpaper web pages is to draw together information, case studies, advice and inspiration to make it easier for people in all walks of society to cut wasteful paper use.
In 2012-13 we assessed 60 UK organisations on their paper efficiency and ran a series of events to highlight the link between paper use and climate change. See the results here.
Saving paper has so many benefits: you save money, you feel good and you tread more lightly on the earth.