index > Today's Earth, Our Future > 2. Gifts from the forests > A Story about Paper
 
A Story about Paper
When we look at the pillars of a house, furniture and disposable chopsticks, we can easily see that the wood came from the trees in the forests. But do you know a super powerful form of wood? The answer is "paper." In Japan, 40% of the wood is made into paper. It is hard to imagine our daily lives without paper, isn't it? When, how much and what kind of paper do you think we use from morning till night? In 1999, about 300 million tons of paper was used in the world. If we stacked up these sheets of paper, it would equal the distance of eight trips to the moon and back! The use of paper has increased more than six times since 1950. The amount of paper we use will continue to increase at an alarming rate. So, when we think about the forests, we must think carefully about paper too. In developed countries, more and more paper is being used for printing. As the economy grows in developing countries, the amount of paper used in these countries is also increasing. How can all the people in the world keep using paper necessary in our daily lives without damaging the forests and the earth? It is important to think about both "paper producers" and "paper users." Let's start by looking at this problem from the producers' point of view. Raw materials for paper include wood, used paper, and non-wood materials. Of the global paper supply, 55% is from newly cut trees, 38% is from recycled paper, and the remaining 7% comes from non-wood materials, such as kenaf, hemp, and straw from rice and wheat. As a way of protecting the forests, paper producers can increase the use of used paper and non-wood materials. Many countries actually collect used paper and recycle it as material for making paper. The world's collection rate of used paper is 43%. Boosted by a waste reduction law, the rate in Germany is 72%, while it is 53% in Japan and 43% in the U.S. We see newspaper, fliers, and magazines around us everyday. When we throw them away, they become only troublesome garbage. Let's recycle them to protect the forests.
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   2. Gifts from the forests
   
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