According to the related research of WWF, the five largest disposable paper products manufacturers in Europe are Procter & Gamble, SCA Paper Company, Kimberly-Clark Company, Meisha Paper Tissue Company and Georgia Pacific Packaging Company. These five manufacturers control about 70% of the paper products market in Europe, and in most of their products, the content of renewable fiber is very low.
WWF said in its announcement that this means that "unused fibers" obtained from some natural forests and tree plantations around the world are regarded as garbage without consumers' knowledge. Burrard said: "When consumers go to the bathroom, they don't realize that they may pose a threat to the world's forest resources."
According to the report, the annual trade volume of toilet paper in Europe is about 8.5 billion euros (about 654.38 billion US dollars), accounting for 26% of the total global sales. Every year, every European uses 13 kg of paper products on average. At present, WWF has asked these paper products manufacturers to tell consumers more clearly how much renewable fiber is contained in household paper products and suggest them to buy renewable products. (International Online Exclusive Information Wang Gaoshan)
United Nations: Afforestation in China has slowed down the rate of forest loss on the earth.
Xinhua News: The New York Times published an article on June 5438+05, saying that planting trees in China benefits the whole world.
According to a new report of the United Nations, extensive afforestation in China has slowed down the shrinking of the earth's forests, but tropical deforestation is still increasing, many of which are in areas that have never been cut down before. The Rome-based FAO released the survey report on its website yesterday.
"Although gratifying progress is being made in many places, unfortunately, forest resources are still decreasing or degrading at an alarming rate," said Hosni La cagney, Assistant Director-General for Forestry of FAO.
Some forest experts say that the rate of forest area reduction is encouraging, but biologists believe that the forest area increased by afforestation mostly inhibits some animal and plant diversity that has been destroyed with the destruction of virgin forests. In China, the forest coverage area is generally expanding, while the tropical forest area is shrinking. This report compares the forest development trends in the past five years and11990s. In this report, the annual net reduction of forests in South America exceeds that in Africa.
Matt wilkie of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations said that the changes in Asia during 10 were particularly great: in the 1990s, it reduced its forest area by about 7,800 square kilometers every year, but since 2000, its forest area has increased by nearly10,000 square kilometers every year. However, almost all these changes are due to the new forest policy adopted by China. According to the report, tropical forests in other parts of Asia are still being cut down at an increasing rate.
The EU is responsible for the destruction of large forests in poor countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America.
Xinhua News: According to the report of Reuters, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) said in its report on June 2 1 that EU member countries illegally imported a large amount of wood from economically backward countries, which accelerated the destruction of major forest resources in these countries.
According to the report, Britain is "the largest illegal timber importer in Europe" and should be responsible for the annual disappearance of 600,000 hectares of forest resources in Asia, Africa and Latin America. This figure is more than twice that of Luxembourg.
According to the report of the World Wildlife Fund, which is headquartered in Switzerland, this kind of deforestation is out of commercial interests, but it deprives the local people of their livelihood and will lead to the disappearance of large forests in Africa and Indonesia in the next 10 year.
The forestry experts of the organization completed the investigation report after studying the timber trade between EU countries and Amazon basin countries, Congo basin countries and East African countries, as well as Indonesia and Russia. These experts also investigated the situation of Baltic countries that have become members of the European Union.
Illegal logging means that some companies illegally cut down trees in violation of forest protection measures of relevant countries. These illegally cut timber were smuggled to another country before entering the world market. Britain's illegal timber imports rank first in Europe, followed by Finland, Germany, France, Italy and the Netherlands.
According to the report, it is very important for the EU to issue an order to ban illegal timber imports as soon as possible, so as to change the current policy of encouraging its 25 member States to reach import agreements with timber producing countries.
Duncan Pollard, head of the European Forest Protection Project of the World Wildlife Fund, believes that the EU must take tougher actions if it wants to make a difference in protecting the world's most important forest resources and helping poor countries get rid of poverty.
Andrew Lee, an official of the foundation, pointed out that during its presidency of the European Union, Britain took "poverty alleviation" as its central task. He said: "Britain's huge consumption of timber plundered the income of Indonesia and African countries, while the international big companies involved in timber trading made a lot of money."
Starting from the discontinuation of disposable chopsticks in Qingdao
2005-9-20 1 1:23:44
Qingdao recently issued a regulation that from the beginning of September 2005 to June 30, 2006, Qingdao's production enterprises will no longer be able to produce disposable chopsticks, non-degradable plastic tableware, plastic bags and other products that cause "white pollution". After June 5438+October 30, 2006/KLOC-0, enterprises, units or individuals that produce, sell or use these articles may be fined up to 20,000 yuan.
Qingdao Economic and Trade Commission, Municipal Administration for Industry and Commerce, Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau and Municipal Construction Committee jointly issued the Notice on Prohibiting the Use of Disposable Chopsticks and Non-degradable Plastic Tableware and Packaging Bags. According to a preliminary estimate, at present, Qingdao uses 6.5438 million pairs of disposable chopsticks every day, but it is difficult to count the degradable plastic packaging used in farmers' markets, and there is no unit in Qingdao to recycle these catering wastes. The person in charge of the market outlets of Qingdao Economic and Trade Commission introduced their consideration of issuing this notice.
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Person in charge of the branch: At first, this matter was put forward in 2000, when normative documents were issued from the perspective of environmental pollution. Including the division of responsibilities between law enforcement units and management, and how to punish those who violate this requirement. From the point of view of environmental protection and pollution control, this policy is a useful document in recent years. This time, countries, provinces and cities have proposed to create a conservation-oriented society, and catering can take the lead. From this perspective, we only learn from the previous individual division of labor and the previous laws, and put forward new requirements from the perspective of building a conservation-oriented society.
Moderator: Stop the production of disposable chopsticks completely. What do you think will be the difficulty in promoting these production enterprises?
Person in charge of the network: Qingdao is not an independent and isolated market, including the surrounding production enterprises, including those in Shandong Province and the whole country. This situation is not uncommon. From the perspective of hygiene, consumers also have the habit of hygienic consumption. Now we give catering enterprises a buffer period. We know that there are some provinces and cities in China and there are some substitutes. In this transitional period, there is a technical connection in this regard. Now is the transition period, choose other alternative products, and then you won't be caught off guard.
Compere: What might this alternative product look like?
Person in charge of the branch: After the announcement, the social response was quite great, and some companies outside the province, including some substitutes, also called us. This substitute, including quality and cost, is much lower than the existing wooden chopsticks and bamboo chopsticks. Moderator: Generally speaking, what is the attitude of these businesses and enterprises? Person in charge of the network: From the perspective of ordinary people, most people welcome it, because saving is a matter for the whole society. Enterprises and businesses are relatively calm, and enterprises know more information than we do. They also feel that there are some substitutes, and the cost will not increase them much.
In many restaurants, disposable tableware, including disposable chopsticks, disposable paper cups and lunch boxes, can be seen everywhere. Disposable wooden chopsticks, in particular, have spread rapidly since they were popularized in the 1980s, and now they have become indispensable dining utensils on the dining table. So, why can disposable wooden chopsticks become popular?
The owner of a restaurant spoke out the merchant's consideration: we should use at least 4000 pairs of disposable chopsticks a month, which is cheap and convenient. In a commodity market, you can buy one hundred pairs of disposable wooden chopsticks for two yuan. Disposable wooden chopsticks are really cheap.
A waiter in a restaurant said that the first thing their restaurant provided to consumers was reusable sterilized chopsticks, but many consumers demanded to switch to disposable wooden chopsticks. The food quality and environmental sanitation of small and medium-sized restaurants are difficult to reassure, which makes consumers show strong dependence on disposable products.
According to relevant data, China consumes 45 billion pairs of disposable chopsticks every year, consumes about 22 million cubic meters of wood, and needs to cut down about 25 million trees and reduce the forest area by 2 million square meters. If these chopsticks are connected end to end, it is equivalent to 330 laps around the equator of the earth!
The waste of disposable wooden chopsticks is not limited to wood. Most disposable wooden chopsticks are packed in plastic film. Once this plastic film is torn off, it will become useless, pollute the environment and waste the oil used to produce plastic film.
In addition, disposable chopsticks may also become a killer that harms human health.
Everyone has the experience of using disposable chopsticks when eating out. Many people only want to use disposable chopsticks when eating out, thinking that this way is more hygienic and safer. However, recent studies have proved that this kind of disposable chopsticks is far more harmful than sterilized non-disposable tableware.
Dong Jinshi, deputy secretary-general of Beijing Environmental Science Society who specializes in disposable tableware, said that compared with the color of ordinary wood, disposable chopsticks in many restaurants are very white, which is not a good thing. The raw materials used by regular manufacturers to produce disposable chopsticks are all wood with good texture and have not been specially processed. However, in order to reduce costs, some small workshops use inferior wood, which looks darker. Some lawless elements will fumigate and bleach chopsticks with sulfur in order to "whiten" them.
A large amount of sulfur dioxide will be produced after sulfur gas bleaching, and sulfur dioxide will solidify when it is cold. Therefore, when eating with these chopsticks, sulfur dioxide can easily solidify to the respiratory tract with the flow of air, leading to cough, asthma and other diseases.
In the mid-1980s, with the vigorous development of market economy, the accelerated pace of people's life and the development of tourism, disposable chopsticks developed rapidly. In order to prevent the spread of diseases, China began to promote disposable chopsticks, and many restaurants began to use disposable chopsticks.
In the mid-1990s, people began to realize the environmental problems brought by chopsticks. Plastic bags, plastic lunch boxes and wooden chopsticks are discarded along highways and railways; The flood of 1998 caused by deforestation has once again attracted people's attention to disposable chopsticks. At the same time, other Asian countries have begun to pay attention to disposable chopsticks. Korea began to use metal chopsticks instead of disposable wooden chopsticks six years ago.
Environmentalists in China have waged a war on this simple and convenient tableware to replace disposable chopsticks. Use the spoon consciously. The driver Kang Hu Da often runs transportation. Every time he goes to a restaurant, he takes out his chopsticks. After eating, he washed the chopsticks and put them in a small cloth bag with him, and resisted the use of disposable chopsticks with practical actions. The waiter in the restaurant laughs at him every time he sees such a move. But he never wavered.
Zhang Zhe, 24, became an environmental volunteer when she went to college. She organized a team with spoons and chopsticks in the university. There were only five at first, and then it grew to more than 200. These volunteers also successfully persuaded the school cafeteria to stop using disposable chopsticks.
Zhu Shuiqing, head of the green club of Harbin Institute of Technology students, said that when I first went to college, I could see several barrels of used disposable chopsticks after eating in the canteen. 1999,' Green Association' proposed to the school to cancel disposable chopsticks and encourage students to use bamboo chopsticks. The school quickly bought several new sterilizers to relieve everyone's worries about using bamboo chopsticks. Now there are no disposable chopsticks in Harbin Institute of Technology dining hall.
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Student: In the past, disposable chopsticks were used in our school canteen. We mobilized all the people in our school to bring their own spoons to eat. We put up posters in the canteen every day to publicize and oppose disposable chopsticks and put an end to the use of disposable chopsticks in schools. It lasted for a year before the school cafeteria really agreed to change disposable chopsticks. It bought a complete set of disinfection equipment, although we have put an end to disposable chopsticks at school now. But in society, we can see many restaurants that only use disposable chopsticks. In some schools, we still see many canteens using disposable chopsticks. So we think we should use our experience to change the habit of using disposable chopsticks. The project of disposable chopsticks began last year.
Moderator: When you promote this concept of environmental protection without disposable chopsticks to your classmates at school, do you think it is easy for everyone to accept it? Student: I think disposable chopsticks are relatively easy for everyone to accept. If we use disposable chopsticks every day, there are about 40 thousand people in our school, and we will use1.20 thousand pairs of chopsticks every day.
Not long ago, a company issued such a regulation, which caused quite a shock among employees: in order to practice economy and inherit virtue, all employees of our company must bring their own chopsticks when eating out from August 28. Those who violate the regulations will be fined once 10 yuan; those who violate the regulations for three times in a row or refuse to implement them will be dismissed.
An employee said that in order not to be fined, he had to bring chopsticks to work, but he felt embarrassed. Thrift is a good thing, and once a fine is established, it will deteriorate. Some employees also said: there is no need for supervision, which is of little significance to the rescue itself. Belt and use are two different things. However, some employees who are in favor of the regulations believe that bringing their own chopsticks is not harmful to themselves, but also a contribution to environmental protection.
The person in charge of a restaurant said, we don't welcome bringing our own tableware. Guests bring their own chopsticks, which is a saving for the hotel's financial and human resources. Liu Jingli of a high-end hotel said that under normal circumstances, customers are not allowed to bring their own chopsticks, otherwise the health disputes caused by it cannot be solved. If guests insist on bringing chopsticks, the hotel will not interfere, but they must say hello in advance to ensure the hygiene of using chopsticks. Hotels and restaurants generally use bamboo chopsticks, which are disinfected before use. It doesn't make sense for hotels to bring their own chopsticks.
The widespread use of disposable products was once regarded as a revolution in the field of consumption by western developed countries. This consumption mode has brought many advantages to consumers, such as simplicity, convenience and sanitation, but disposable products have brought convenience to people, and at the same time, they have gradually exposed their excessive waste of resources.
In South Korea, the government explicitly prohibits the use of disposable wooden chopsticks, and people are used to using steel chopsticks when eating. Although the use of disposable tableware is not prohibited in Japan, according to statistics released by the Japanese government, only 3% of the more than 25 billion pairs of disposable chopsticks consumed in Japan are made in China, and the rest are imported from China.
European countries rarely use disposable goods, and disposable tableware is not seen in restaurants. Many supermarkets use large paper bags to pack customers, and plastic bags are charged to limit the pollution of plastic bags to the environment.
At the third meeting of the 10th CPPCC Committee in Beijing this year, Yu Yanhua, a member of CPPCC, put forward proposal No.0776 "Proposal on Restricting the Use of Disposable Chopsticks in Beijing". Member Yu Yanhua said that in Beijing, the production, sale and use of disposable chopsticks have become a blind spot in people's lives. The use of disposable chopsticks facilitates our life and meets our demand for tableware hygiene, but the price paid is the waste of wood resources and the lack of precious forest resources.
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Moderator: At that time, how could you pay attention to the problem of disposable chopsticks?
Yu Yanhua: In recent years, some small and medium-sized restaurants use disposable chopsticks more. But I think we are a big country that uses chopsticks, and using disposable chopsticks in large quantities is a great waste of wood. It should be said that our country is not very rich in resources at present, and I think wasting so much will be unfavorable to our country's production in the future. I also heard that some developed countries, especially those in Asia, such as Japan, also use chopsticks, but they seldom use disposable chopsticks. When I made my suggestions, I also listened to the opinions of the surrounding residents. When we held a forum, everyone unanimously opposed the use of disposable chopsticks. Although the production of disposable chopsticks has placed some labor force and some enterprises have gained some benefits, it is not suitable for long-term existence. I think disposable chopsticks are only one aspect of saving. It should be said that we are now vigorously promoting a conservation-oriented country, so we should start from every little thing around us. Of course, we also suggest whether to bring chopsticks and tableware when eating, but it is not realistic. But I think it would be nice if everyone in the restaurant could pay attention to it and not use disposable chopsticks.
Moderator: When you put forward this proposal, what do you think is the key link if this work can be carried out more effectively?
Yu Yanhua: I think this link should start with publicity and make efforts to change people's concepts. But I don't think it is difficult to change my mind. Disposable chopsticks, after all, have only recently appeared. The production of disposable chopsticks is unsanitary, and people just think it is sanitary. In fact, in some small workshops, disposable chopsticks are unsanitary. I still feel that there is not enough publicity, because the production of enterprises involves the placement of labor and government taxes, which is definitely difficult. Therefore, we should strengthen our work from the government and make some efforts for the resettlement of labor force and the transformation of enterprises.
Moderator: At that time, after you put forward this proposal, the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Commerce also gave you an answer. What's their answer?
Yu Yanhua: Their reply is that they have been working hard in this regard. At present, at their request, middle and high-end restaurants basically do not use disposable chopsticks, but a large number of small restaurants are still in use. The key points need to be further improved and gradually banned. Therefore, banning the use of paper may not be enough.
Member Yu Yanhua said that the publicity of "the negative effects of using disposable chopsticks" should be strengthened through colorful forms, so that the public can really understand what consequences the convenience of using disposable chopsticks will bring to the whole society, and thus psychologically agree with the necessity and urgency of restricting the use of disposable chopsticks. Public understanding and recognition will enhance the feasibility of public policies and greatly reduce the cost of policy implementation. However, the introduction of relevant regulations can only be a guide. Gradually eliminating the use of disposable chopsticks has become a consumption habit, which requires the joint efforts of all members of society.
Fast-paced life and the pursuit of high quality make us choose disposable products without hesitation. The cheapness of industrial production reassured us. What's wrong with spending a little money on convenience? As a result, one-time consumption is popular. However, while people enjoy the convenience in luxury, shocking waste also begins.
Saving lies in renewing ideas and changing habits. Moderate consumption and rejection of waste are not only the performance of responsible citizens, but also the necessity of sustainable development. Building a "conservation-oriented society" is not only a slogan, but also should be implemented in each of us. Including some very small savings, such as unplugging electrical appliances when not in use; Water at home can be used twice; Turn up the air conditioner in the office a few degrees and so on. These are all humble thrifty behaviors, but if everyone forms such a habit and sticks to it, the benefits should be enormous.