Two Sides, Anti-Greenwash Campaign
As a result of Two Sides ongoing educational campaign, over 30 leading North American companies have removed or corrected their ‘anti-paper’ environmental claims being used to promote electronic billing and other e-services as a more environmentally-friendly solution than paper. These companies are primarily top Fortune 500 organizations in the banking, utilities and telecommunications sectors.
The main reasons for challenging the claims are as follows:
– Marketing claims like ‘go paperless, save trees’ do not meet guidelines for environmental marketing established by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Competition Bureau of Canada.
– Print on paper made in North America has many unique environmental characteristics compared to other products. It originates from a renewable resource, trees grown in responsibly managed forests, is recyclable and is the most recycled commodity in the U.S. with a recovery rate of over 63 percent in 2013 (American Forest & Paper Association, 2014). In Canada, the recovery rate of waste paper and packaging was 73 percent in 2012 (Forest Products Association of Canada, 2014).
– Marketing messages like ‘save trees’ create a false impression that forests are a finite resource, being destroyed; while, in truth, forests are a renewable resource that is continuously replenished using sustainable forest management practices. In North America we grow many more trees than we harvest. Over the last six decades, the total U.S. forest area has increased by over 3% and the net volume of trees on timberland has increased by 58% (U.S. Department of Agriculture, 2012). In Canada, the forest cover has remained stable over the last two decades and, in recent years, Canada’s actual harvest has been 44% of annual growth (The Conference Board of Canada, 2014).
– The direct impact of information and communication technology (ICT) products and services replacing paper is far from negligible, and the trade-off between the two ‘technologies’ depends on conditions such as use frequency, source of energy, and end-of-life management of the products (Arnfalk, P. 2010).
– Unsubstantiated environmental marketing claims like “go paperless, go green” are damaging to the North American economy and threaten jobs. In fact, a total of 8.4 million jobs (6% of total U.S. jobs) that generate $1.3 trillion in sales revenue (8.6% of U.S. gross domestic product) depend on the U.S. mailing industry, which includes paper production, printing production, related suppliers, graphic design and the handling and distribution of mail (Envelope Manufacturers Association, 2013). In Canada, there are over 800,000 mail-related jobs, almost 5% of all jobs in the country. Revenues from this sector are estimated at $88 billion, or 5% of total GDP in Canada (Envelope Manufacturers Association and Robustion Technologies Inc., 2014).
