This is the Finsbury Green guide to ‘green’ paper which is not green paper as such but rather paper which is… oh, you know what I mean.
It’s pro-paper, obviously, coming from a printer, and doesn’t stray too far from the accepted formulations about paper as a sustainable resource derived from certified forests etc. It’s got good information about paper types and the various certification schemes and symbols. This kind of resource used to be produced by the paper merchants but because this one is put out by a printer, it’s a bit more broad-based and comprehensive in terms of the papers it covers.
It’s interesting in a paper kind of way. Of course, the one thing it doesn’t include is pricing. That’s fair enough; price is always negotiable when it comes to paper. The point is, for many paper users, it will also be the important criteria for purchase, regardless of any good intentions about saving the environment. Not everybody will buy on price – some will put always environmental factors foremost – but, for a significant number, budget is a constraining factor.
You can argue about the environmental ins and outs of paper production until you go green in the face but if users aren’t prepared to pay for it or, even more insidiously, use environmental concerns as an excuse for cost-cutting with digital media, then ultimately you may as well go and tell it to the trees.
That’s the sad thing about publications like this one, for all their usefulness and desire to educate and inform; there’s a discomfiting sense that the green paper boat, so to speak, has already sailed.
I don’t think it’s going to convince anybody or change minds but it’s a useful aid for people who are already committed to paper. Available from Finsbury Green.
