Red Lines for Pulp Mill Finance

2 June 2016Leave a comment

The Environmental Paper Network* (EPN), and BankTrack** today published a short document, Green Paper, Red Lines, setting out minimum requirements for the pulp and paper industry to avoid harming people and the environment. This document urges banks and investors who consider financially supporting pulp and paper companies to thoroughly check whether these companies are on the right side of these ‘red lines’.

The ‘red lines’, listed in the document, are the absolute minimum requirements for pulp and paper mills, and cover regulatory, social, environmental and corporate issues. Unless pulp and paper mills fulfil these requirements, they are likely to cause unacceptable social and environmental harm.

The standards are absolute minimum requirements. Companies that achieve these standards are not automatically deemed to be operating in a sustainable manner. However, if companies, and financiers providing support to them, cross these red lines, they are highly likely to be the target of campaigns by civil society organisations.

EPN and BankTrack therefore expect financiers to stay clear if their client pulp and paper companies are unable to meet the minimum requirements.

Mandy Haggith, co-ordinator of the Environmental Paper Network’s pulp finance working group, said: “We want banks and other investors to be our allies in helping to transform the pulp and paper industry towards our Global Paper Vision, by focusing finance only where the industry is sustainable. We hope these red lines will be used by banks to avoid projects and companies with a high level of reputational risk due to their negative environmental and social impacts.”

Karen Vermeer, forest and Equator Principles campaigner at BankTrack, said: “We will use the red lines of this document to check the forest policies of private sector banks, and push for more sustainable policies where necessary.”

* EPN is a network of more than 140 non-governmental organisations globally, focussing on pulp and paper sustainability issues across the global supply chain and paper’s life cycle.

** BankTrack is the international tracking, campaigning and NGO support organisation focused on private sector commercial banks and the activities they finance.

Link(s)

Contact

Mandy Haggith | | +44 7734235704
Karen Vermeer | | +31 24 3249220

New EEPN report on pulp mill expansion launched at the World Forestry Congress

8 September 201524 September 2015Leave a comment

On the Civil Society Alternative Programme (CSAP) of the 14^th FAO World Forestry Congress (WFC), held 7-11^th Septemberin Durban, South Africa, the European Environmental Paper Network(EEPN) introduced its new report Mapping Pulp Mill Expansion – Risks and Recommendations to the civil society and representatives of the FAO and WFC.

Global paper consumption and production has been growing at a steady rate for decades. It has quadrupled since 1960 and is expected to keep growing. EEPN analyzed the upcoming virgin wood fibre pulp mills and their possible impacts on surrounding forests and land-use, by overlapping with maps of intact forests, of ongoing and upcoming deforestation and of sensitive habitats.

The report:

reflects a rising global demand for pulp and paper in the future, points out the inequitable access to paper and the need for reducing paper consumption in industrialized countries.

provides a general overview of each region of the world where new pulp mills are expected or under construction, and includes maps visualizing their general proximity to identified deforestation fronts and intact forest landscapes.

shows that current pulp and paper production is concentrated in Asia, North America and North and Western Europe, while most of the future pulp production capacity increase is expected to take place in Asia, Russia and South America.

points out possible impacts and potential risks of increased demand for forest resources in the vicinity of new pulp and paper projects on endangered habitats, environment and local communities.

provides recommendations for producers, investors, policy makers and large volume paper buyers or retailers who are concerned about climate and deforestation risks.

The recommendations are an application of an international conservation community consensus for social and environmental transformation in the pulp and paper industry detailed in EPN’s Global Paper Vision. With these recommendations the international coalition of NGOs of EPN intends to provide measures and steps for implementing responsible and sustainable paper production, investment and purchasing.

As the 14th World Forestry Congress aims to build a new vision with a new way of thinking and acting for the future of forests and forestry in sustainable development at all levels, EPN’s hope is that this new report is a contribution to meet these goals, and it calls FAO to adopt a set of goals as ambitious as the recommendations presented by the civil society’s organizations.

EPN is also calling financial institutions to adopt investment policies which ensure that their lending and investments do not cause further deforestation or lead to disputes with indigenous peoples and local communities, adopting effective environmental and social due diligence procedures and covenants included in contracts, binding the client to comply with the bank’s sustainability requirements.

Download Full Report Download Summary

Please don’t pulp the last Swedish old-growth forests!

23 April 201517 June 2015Leave a comment

Sweden produces more paper than any other country in Europe, but at what cost? A letter signed by 45 non-governmental organisations (NGOs) has asked the Swedish government to introduce tighter legislation to improve forestry practices in the country. It expresses concern that clearcut forestry threatens some of the last remaining fragments of old-growth forests in Scandinavia, endangering species and the livelihoods of indigenous Sami people.

Most of the NGOs signing the letter are our member organisations. Letter to Swedish government april 2015.

Find here the reply of the Swedish government.

New film: The Future of Paper

29 January 201515 August 2015Leave a comment

A new film expressing a vision for the future of paper was launched by civil society today in advance of Paper World, the paper industry gathering in Frankfurt, Germany. The film argues that as a global society we need to look at this everyday material with new eyes, and transform the way we use it to achieve a more equitable and sustainable future.

Mandy Haggith of the European Environmental Paper Network (EEPN) said, “We hope that everyone who watches the Future of Paper will value it a bit more and think again about wasteful paper use. Everyone in Europe, North America and China uses paper numerous times every day and yet we mostly take it for granted. This film will help people to make the connection between their own daily consumption and the impacts it has on forests, people, the global climate and water.”

Peter Gerhardt of German NGO denkhausbremen, said, “Current paper consumption in industrialised countries must be reduced dramatically in order to lower the pressure on forests and forest people, who suffer from the impacts of the pulp and paper industry around the world.”

Richard Wainwright of FERN, said “This film urges paper companies to rise to the realistic and achievable challenge of ensuring paper production is never to the detriment of local communities who depend on the forests for their survival.”

The film is the outcome of an international process over the past year, in which more than 140 organisations around the world have endorsed a shared Global Paper Vision. This vision describes a future in which the pulp and paper industry and all governments, financiers and consumer companies associated with the industry, have transformed to achieve sustainable production and consumption.

The film can also be watched on the Youtube Channel of the Environmental Paper Network here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7e9yEc7FUs

For more information contact:

Mandy Haggith on +44 1571 844020 or +44 7734235704 or [email protected]

Paper making in China, the traditional way

Helping China Achieve Sustainable Paper Production and Use

19 August 201419 August 2014Leave a comment

What is China’s impact on forests and communities, given that it is the world’s biggest paper consumer and the fastest-growing investor in the pulp and paper industry? Activists from Indonesia and from the Chinese Environmental Paper Network are working together to increase understanding of this question. To assist this learning process, we are organising an exchange between environmental activists from China and Indonesia, together with European and North American campaigners.

During September and October 2014, Chinese activists will travel to Indonesia, and Indonesians will travel to China. The Indonesian visit will involve meetings in Jakarta and travel into forest lands in Sumatra, to observe the impacts on the ground of pulp and paper production, and to meet representatives of affected communities. The participants will learn about the impact of the policies and practices of the pulp and paper industry, governments and finance in Indonesia, and consider the role that China is and should be playing.

The return visit will involve a public event on 15 October exploring China’s role in the global publishing paper trail, looking at how printers and publishers can make sustainable paper choices, to supply books to Chinese and international markets with the miminum environmental and social harm. This visit will also include learning about the methods of paper production that have been carried out sustainably for thousands of years since paper was invented there, and it will be a chance for international campaigners to learn about Chinese culture and the potential and challenges for environmental advocacy.

Following the launch of our Global Paper Vision earlier this summer, this project demonstrates that the Environmental Paper Network is a truly global coalition, working together to find international solutions to the environmental and social problems caused byÂ the pulp and paper industry in Indonesia and other producer countries.

Tasmania’s zombie pulp mill vanquished?

12 May 201415 August 2015Leave a comment

Australian campaigners are optimistic that they may have succeeded in their mission to ensure that no company buys the permits to build and operate the Tasmanian ‘zombie’ pulp mill. There have been concerns over the past few months that the pulp mill planned by Gunns several years ago, and defeated after a vigorous campaign by locals and environmentalists, was at risk of coming back to life.

Peg Putt, of Markets for Change, explains why there is once again cause for celebration.

“It has been announced that Gunns’ plantation estate and other assetts have sold to New Forests, a plantation company, who say they have no interest in the pulp mill permits and won’t buy them. The purchase of the feedstock required for this mill without also buying the pulp mill permits makes it very difficult for the mill to proceed, as they won’t have the guaranteed volumes of plantation wood they need to operate it.

The pulp mill permits remain on sale, but it isn’t only we green groups who think the pulp mill proposal might be dead: ABC says that the pulp mill is ‘dead in the water’.Â We won’t get a final announcement however, as the receivers must continue to try and sell everything no matter how unlikely. Also both major political parties here can’t lose face by admitting they’ve backed a loser.

Have a look at our facebook page – people are very pleased. https://www.facebook.com/marketsforchange

The Heemskerk meeting on pulp mill finance organised by EPN and BankTrack was timely and very helpful for us. Skills learnt and contacts made were vital to our ability to get the message out re this odious proposal. We are very grateful.

We still have a tremendous fight on our hands in Tasmania to defend 74,000 hectares of World Heritage listed forests that our new government wants to open up for logging, plus another 400,000 hectares of high conservation value forests that are to be re-allocated into future logging zones under new legislation just introduced (they are currently designated for protection in future reserves). We fear that some of this could be fed to a pulp mill in the future if the government wants to revive the zombie by changing the hard fought provision for plantation only feedstock.
But right now Tasmania’s zombie pulp mill looks dead. We hope we don’t discover again that it is only resting.”

Peg Putt
CEO – Markets For Change

Environmental Paper Network – International

Category: Global Paper Industry