The stained whiteness of a sheet of paper
The whiteness of a sheet of paper hides obscure stories of environmental degradation and social dispossession. However, those stories are seldom known by consumers living far away from where the (Read More)
Bulletin Issue 83 – June 2004
THE FOCUS OF THIS ISSUE: THE IMPACTS OF PULP PRODUCTION
The production of pulp and paper has long been associated with deforestation and environmental pollution. More recently, it has been the driving force behind the spread of fast-growth tree monocultures to feed ever increasing paper and cardboard consumption. Given that trees grow faster in tropical and subtropical countries –where land, water and labour are cheap and where environmental protection is less stringent than in the North- the industry has also begun to shift pulp production to the South.
Given the destructive character of both pulpwood plantations and pulp production, we thought it useful for people involved in or affected by plantations or pulp-related pollution, to dedicate an entire WRM bulletin to this issue. The first part of the bulletin aims at clarifying the general aspects of pulp production and consumption, while the second part focuses on specific country situations.
OUR VIEWPOINT
THE PULP AND PAPER SCENARIO
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The Paper Tread: From Need to Greed
Long time ago the need of our first ancestors to transmit words and images found their way on stone walls, clay tablets, wax-coated boards, animal hides and other media. Later, (Read More)
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The production of pulp
Pulp mills process timber in order to obtain the main raw material for paper production: pulp. They are usually large factories located close to where timber is cut, that is (Read More)
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Pulp Mills and Tree Plantations: A Duo in Power
The dispossession, deforestation and pollution caused by the pulp and paper industry is tied to a dynamic of ever-increasing scale, concentration and capital intensiveness which has characterized the industry since (Read More)
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How the Pulp Industry Tries to Manage Resistance
Pulp mills’ extremely large scale makes it necessary for them to simplify under a central authority not only landscapes, biological diversity and genetic diversity, but also political systems. The sheer (Read More)
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Schoolbooks, Shops and Subsidies: Renegotiating Paper Consumption
Ashis Nandy, the Indian psychologist and social critic, once defined progress as “growth in the awareness of oppression”. What he meant, in part, is that we are fortunate that due (Read More)
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The mythical correlation between literacy and paper consumption
The present scenario, where most countries have become mere markets for an increasingly reduced group of powerful corporations that share them between themselves while keeping up a network of commercial (Read More)
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Genetically engineered trees: The pulp industry’s dangerous “solution”
Making clean white paper from trees is a dirty business. To make bleached kraft pulp, trees are chipped, cooked under pressure, washed and then bleached. Toxic chemicals are used in (Read More)
THE LOCAL IMPACTS OF PULP MILLS
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Brazil: More pulp for export means more exclusion
A new cycle in the increasing of production of eucalyptus pulp for export began in northern Espirito Santo, the southern region of Bahia and north-eastern Minas Gerais, with the opening (Read More)
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There’s something stinking in southern Chile
Twenty-two months after the beginning of its construction and almost five years behind schedule, the Valdivia mill started operating in the Lakes Region. The announcement was made on 30th January (Read More)
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Uruguay: Either with the people or with pulp mills and tree plantations
Uruguay has been one of the countries in the region that has best and fastest fulfilled the duties others have dictated. Already in 1951, a joint FAO-World Bank mission made (Read More)
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Kenya: Pan African Paper Mills spread sickness
Pulp and paper production in Kenya is presently dominated by one firm, Pan African Paper Mills (Panpaper), which is a joint venture between the Kenyan Government, the World Bank’s private (Read More)
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South Africa: Pulping people and places
‘Pulping the South’ by Larry Lohmann and Ricardo Carrere was a watershed publication for many groups and individuals around the world. Concerned people had been aware of many issues and (Read More)
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China: Restructuring the paper sector to suit a globalised industry
Since 1996, in an attempt to control pollution, China’s State Environmental Protection Administration has closed thousands of pulp and paper mills. “A significant portion of urban as well as rural (Read More)
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The Pulp and Paper Industry in Indonesia: A Growing Disaster
In the early 1980s the Indonesian government launched an ambitious forestry plan entitled “Industrial Timber Plantation (HTI) and Pulp Industry Development.” In the early stages of its development, pulpwood plantations (Read More)
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Thailand: A pulp mill with a long history
Established in 1989, Advance Agro Public Company Limited is located in Prachinburi province. Its main business is producing and selling pulp and printing and writing paper. The company’s production capacity (Read More)
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Vietnam: A divided community around the Tan Mai Paper Mill
Just meters beyond the outer wall of Tan Mai Paper mill, a thriving industry exists in the shade of coconut trees. In ponds where rice fields used to lie, local (Read More)