Canada's Boreal Forest is North America's largest ancient forest
and provides habitat for threatened wildlife such as woodland
caribou, wolverine and over one billion migratory birds. The new
agreement ensures that Kimberly-Clark, which makes Kleenex-brand
products, will no longer be purchasing pulp from the three million
hectare Kenogami and Ogoki Forests in northern Ontario unless
strict ecological criteria are met. These two areas within key
zones of intact forest have been at the center of Greenpeace's
Kleercut campaign.
As part of the agreement, Greenpeace announced that its nearly
five-year-long Kleercut campaign against Kimberly-Clark is
ended.
Greenpeace quotes from the news conference in Washington, DC:
"Today's announcement shows that perseverance and dedication can
achieve great environmental victories even after many years of
campaigning."
"We're gone from conflict and controversy to collaboration and
this new policy is a first product of the new relationship we have
with Kimberly-Clark."
"I am looking forward to working with Kimberly-Clark on the full
implementation of this policy. Because of Kimberly-Clark's size -
it uses more than 4.5 million tonnes of fibre and pulp each year to
make it products -, this new policy will have a profound effect on
the global forest products industry."
"I expect to a large ripple effect from this policy and its
implementation for years to come. We have moved a mountain and that
is going to have impacts around the world."
-Richard Brooks, Greenpeace Canada's forest campaign
coordinator
The news conference was held at Washington DC.
Major news outlets from Canada and the United States
attended.
The success of the discussions between Greenpeace and
Kimberly-Clark means a movement away from conflict to a new
collaborative relationship to further promote forest conservation,
responsible forest management, and the use of recycled fiber for
the manufacture of tissue products.
The power of activists and market pressure
Greenpeace's Kleercut campaign was launched in November
2004.
This campaign to help protect ancient forests in Canada and
globally applied pressure on the company via the marketplace and
its large customers and consumers. In order to highlight the issue,
hundreds of protests took place globally, resulting in more than 50
activists arrested in acts of peaceful civil disobedience.
Scientific and exposé reports, media mobilization and shareholder
engagement were also an important part of the campaign.
This work and dedication reached a successful conclusion with
Kimberly-Clark's release of the strongest paper policy by one of
the world's top three tissue product manufacturers.
Greenpeace's second major forest success this year
The agreement with Kimberly-Clark is the second major victory
this year for Greenpeace's forest campaign. At the end of March,
Greenpeace celebrated an enormous success- the protection of
the Great Bear Rainforest in British Columbia. It is the most
comprehensive rainforest conservation plan in North America and
protects an area nearly the size of Belgium.
The success was the direct result of a decade-long campaign that
thousands of Greenpeace supporters joined.
Implementing the Kimberly-Clark policy
Implementation of the policy will lead to protection of the
world's most endangered forests, increased support for sustainable
forest management through Forest Stewardship Council certification
and the increased use of recycled fiber in Kimberly-Clark
products.
During the evolution of this policy, Kimberly-Clark stopped
buying more than 325,000 tonnes of pulp a year from logging
operations in the Kenogami and Ogoki Forests. The company managing
these forests was unwilling to protect endangered forest areas in
them and supply Kimberly-Clark with Forest Stewardship Council
certified pulp.
The Boreal Forest and climate change
Protection of the Boreal Forest is crucial to world efforts to
stop climate change. This forest is the largest terrestrial
storehouse of carbon on the planet, storing 27 years worth of
greenhouse gas emissions or 186 billion tonnes. If this carbon is
released into the atmosphere it will add to the threat of
catastrophic climate change.
Under the policy Kimberly-Clark has set a goal of ensuring that
100 per cent of the fibre used in its products will be from
environmentally responsible sources. It will greatly increase its
use of recycled fibre and fibre from forest certified to Forest
Stewardship Council standards. By 2011, it will also increase the
use of recycled and FSC fibre [from North America sources] to 40
per cent from 29.7 per cent in 2007. By 2012, the company will no
longer use pulp from the Boreal Forest unless is it certified to
the standards of the
Forest Stewardship Council.
The full policy and its annex can be
downloaded here
Please join us in thanking Kimberly-Clark for supporting
conservation of the Boreal Forest by sending its CEO a
congratulations email