Vancouver-based environmental group Canopy launched a smear campaign against paper packaging some five years ago, claiming that it endangered so-called “ancient” forests; caused deforestation; was wasteful and not “circular” enough: and that “better” alternatives existed (like wheat straw).

Most of these claims have been debunked. Canada does not have any “ancient” forests in the normal sense of the word. Most of Canada’s trees are under 100 years old, and it is the land that is ancient, not the trees. Just as the sea is ancient, not the fish[i].

As for endangered, climate change driven by our use of fossil fuels is impacting 100% of our forests: harvesting trees (mostly for lumber) only 0.2 per cent[ii].

Nor does paper packaging cause any deforestation in Canada, mainly because any forest land harvested in Canada must be regenerated as forest, by provincial and federal law. And most of the packaging board made in Canada is 100% recycled content anyway[iii].

Sure, we can use less packaging and re-use it better, but corrugated re-trippers, as they are called, have been around for decades (and were not invented by Canopy). And when you use leftover wood chips, shavings and sawdust as virgin material and then recycle used boxes again and again, that’s a pretty good argument for being “circular” and not wasteful[iv].  More circular than the wheat industry, anyway.

As for that “waste” straw the wheat industry leaves behind, Canopy picked a loser in promoting Columbia Pulp as an alternative. This wheat straw mill went bankrupt and was a “technical disaster,” according to at least one pulp expert[v]. Relying on a mill by-product (black liquor) to pull you through is always a dangerous gamble too. If that end-market collapses for any reason, the whole economics of the mill goes downhill fast. And what happens to the supply of wheat straw when there’s a drought (as there was on the Prairies in 2021 when eastern farmers were shipping hay west for cattle feed)? Customers want stable supplies of packaging material, not intermittent ones.

So, it was with some surprise recently to see Canopy come out and pump the tires of a German company, Canyon Bicycles, using what seems to be virtually 100% virgin paper fibre[vi]. What about all those forests being “destroyed” for paper packaging? What about that “mass deforestation” Canopy talks about? What about the circular economy? What about recycled content? And no wheat straw?

According to the case study it’s now promoting, Canopy is okay with using trees from certified forests, and is supporting a company that uses mainly virgin fibre. Wow! What a turnaround! All we need now is for Canopy to promote what a great job we are doing in Canada with certified forests. Because Canada has 41% of the entire world’s certified forest area. And that includes 29% of the Forest Stewardship Council’s worldwide certified forest area (which Canopy promotes)[vii].

Not to be too pushy, but maybe, just maybe, Canopy will soon be praising the Canadian industry’s example, instead of roundly condemning it!

Forest charts

[i] John Mullinder, “The misleading and exaggerated claim of ‘ancient’ forests. Canada doesn’t have any!”, January 21, 2019, www.johnmullinder.ca/the-misleading-and-exaggerated-claim-of-ancient-forests-canada-doesnt-have-any/

[ii] Natural Resources Canada, The State of Canada’s Forests, Annual Report 2023, page 85. The latest annual harvested area of 698,026 hectares represents 0.19% of Canada’s forest land of 367,329,767 hectares. www.natural-resources.canada.ca/sites/nrcan/files/forest/sof2023/NRCAN_SofForest_Annual_2023_EN_accessible-vf.pdf

[iii] Paper & Paperboard Packaging Environmental Council (PPEC), “Most Canadian Packaging Board Now 100% Recycled Content,” (press release), PPEC, September 12, 2019, https://www.ppec-paper.com/most-canadian-packaging-board-now-100-recycled-content/

[iv] John Mullinder, “Suzuki Dead Wrong on Paper’s Circular Economy,”, October 1, 2020, www.ppec-paper.com/suzuki-dead-wrong-on-papers-circular-economy/

[v] Bob Hurter, President at HurterConsult, quoted in LinkedIn response to Canopy post “Switching from plastic packaging might feel like a win …”, Hurter said: “COVID may be a convenient excuse for Columbia Pulp’s failure but (it’s) not the true reason. The real reason for its failure is that it was a technical disaster that produced very low quality pulp at a capacity well below the 400 (tons-per-day) mill’s supposed capacity.”

[vi] Canopy, “Pedal-Driven Progress: Canyon Bicycles’ Path to Responsible Packaging,” https://acrobat.adobe.com/id/urn:aaid:sc:VA6C2:72b261e5-b353-4c9e-8cee-2e8738a01b9e  

[vii] Certification Canada, www.certificationcanada.org/en/statistics/canadian-statistics