Although it may not seem like it, the environmental effects of paper on the planet due to its inconsistent use are actually causing negative effects on nature, mainly stemming from the large amounts of cellulose (plant material) required for its production.
Although that thin sheet made from cellulose pulp seems small to us, its importance at a state and international level is enormous from an environmental perspective.
After examining the consequences of inappropriate use of paper, it is certain that we must use paper every day, but we have many tools to try to reduce paper consumption or to try to minimize the impact of paper, it goes to nature for example. Use recycled sheets.
If we see the future of the international paper industry. The report Forest fiber industry – Roadmap 2050 towards a low-carbon bioeconomy that you can consult HERE, states that the future presents positive data from the environmental point of view, although demand decreases:
The use of paper is a factor of total democratization, although with new technologies and mainly thanks to the Internet, its use is decreasing, but it is true that sometimes we forget how much paper pollutes nature and its impact.
How to reduce the use of paper, what can you do?
Paper reuse: We all use a lot of paper here and there to write things down: phone numbers, appointments, names…pretty much any surface we can write on. That is why you should not use new paper for this, but reuse printed sheets, for example.
Print double-sided: A good starting point is that we only print the documents that we really need. We must try to be very cautious with this, printing as little as possible. In any case, it seems interesting that, since we have to print any type of document, we do it on a double page, front and back. With this basic measure, we will be able to save half of the paper that we will consume by printing only one side.
Promote the use of computer media: Thinking with the same coherence, we must maximize the use of computers that we can make in our offices. For example, write everything on paper on a computer, not in a notebook, avoiding the paper format. As we said in the previous section, it would be good to continue printing any document as low as possible, so that only things that are absolutely necessary are printed on paper.
Recycle: All the paper that we have used and that no longer serves us can be recycled, since it is a very simple and useful action that will prolong the life of the materials that we use every day. You can put a box in a corner of your office and put the unnecessary documents in there and once a week take those things to the recycling bin.
Use more sustainable technologies to save paper: Let’s lean on new technologies that promote paperless technology. For example, issue invoices by email instead of traditional mail. Likewise, today there are solutions to optimize the reduction of the use of paper in commercial establishments, many of which are incorporated into the software of POS Systems (Point of Sales), software specifically designed for this purpose. Investing in technology is an excellent option for process automation, error reduction, real-time data backup and control, and most importantly, helping the environment.
