Feature story - November 8, 2006
In the early morning hours of November 9th, Greenpeace activists confronted Kimberly-Clark at its regional headquarters in Turin, Italy demanding that the company “Stop Flushing Canada’s Boreal forest Down Europe’s toilets."
Italian activists outside the Italian headquarters of tissue compay Kimberly-Clark in Turin, Italy.
While activists suspended a massive banner from the rooftop,
othersplaced toilet bowls outside the office with trees being
'flushed down'them, symbolic of the company's destruction of
Canada's ancient Borealforest to make toilet paper and other
disposable tissue products.
Greenpeace has been campaigning to get the
Kimberly-Clarkcorporation, the world's largest tissue product
manufacturer, to endits destruction of the Boreal forest.
Kimberly-Clark produces some ofCanada and Europe's most well known
brands of tissue and toilet paperssuch as Kleenex, Andrex, Scottex,
Page and Hackle. Almost one-third ofthe virgin pulp used to make
Kimberly-Clark European products andone-fifth of its global pulp is
from destructive logging operations inCanadian forests, including
the Boreal forest.
"Ninety percent of the logging that occurs in Canada's Boreal
forest isclearcutting, wiping out vast tracts of ancient forest to
makedisposable products. How can Kimberly- Clark possibly justify
itssupport of this destruction, especially since
environmentally-friendlyalternatives exist?" asked Sergio Baffoni,
Greenpeace forestscampaigner in Italy.
Greenpeace is demanding that Kimberly-Clark dramatically
increasethe use of recycled fibre in their entire line of products
and that anyvirgin fibre it uses be purchased only from sustainable
loggingoperations that are certified to the strict standards of the
ForestStewardship Council.
"Our Canadian natural heritage is being down flushed down
Europeantoilets because Kimberly-Clark continues to act
irresponsibly," saidChristy Ferguson a Toronto-based Greenpeace
forest campaigner. "Caribouherds in forests in Ontario and Alberta
are being wiped out to fuelthis senseless destruction."
Canada's Boreal forest represents more than one quarter of
theworld's remaining ancient forests. The largest terrestrial
storehouseof carbon, it is essential in fighting global
warming.
Take Action
Send a message to Kimberly-Clark demanding an end to forest destruction