Responsible forestry - the antidote to plastic

While life without plastic might be hard to imagine, there is a renewable, recyclable and sustainable alternative to single-use plastics and many other fossil fuel derivatives: wood from responsibly managed plantations and forests. This is the message from Forestry South Africa (FSA) ahead of the 54th annual Earth Day (22 April 2024).

“Since inception in 1970, Earth Day has grown into one of the largest civic events. Against the theme Planet vs Plastic, the need for solutions to ensure the health of the planet could not be more urgent, especially when it comes to dealing with the proliferation of plastic,” says FSA’s Dr Ronald Heath, adding that farmed trees have the unique potential as the starting block for countless materials.

A host of fossil-fuel derived, energy-heavy materials can be substituted with wood-based derivatives such as timber in place of steel and concrete, and specialised cellulose for textiles like viscose and rayon. Paper packaging is finding its way back onto supermarket shelves as brand owners make the switch from plastic. Cellulose and nanocellulose can be used as food additives, functioning as thickening agents, stabilisers or emulsifiers, providing a natural alternative to synthetic additives. Lignin, a by-product of papermaking, can be used as in agriculture, construction and for dust suppression.

“Our sector can even make polymers and chemicals out of wood. And, of course, wood and pulp provide the ingredients for everyday essentials like furniture and toilet paper,” notes Heath.

While wood holds promise in various industries due to its renewable nature, biodegradability and versatile properties, the key to a wood-based revolution is its sustainable, responsible production, the theme of FSA’s new video “What is responsible forestry?”

Across South Africa, from Limpopo and Mpumalanga, through KwaZulu-Natal, to the Eastern and Western Cape, there are 1.2 million hectares of commercial forestry plantations, more than 85% of which are certified as meeting the stringent environmental and social standards set by the Forest Stewardship Council® (FSC®). In addition, 40% of these plantations have international PEFC certification through the recently established Sustainable African Forest Assurance Scheme (SAFAS).

From these plantations, more than 15 million tonnes of wood and fibre are harvested annually and for every tree removed, another is planted in its place. This wood, grown using carbon dioxide (CO2), keeps carbon stored long after harvesting and transformation into timber for beautiful buildings, cellulose for high-end fashion, additives for food and pharmaceuticals, and bio-chemicals. One cubic metre of Eucalyptus wood removes around 880kg of CO2 from the air, storing around 240kg of carbon.

“South African forestry should be recognised as part of the solution for climate change, plastic pollution and rural unemployment. Wood is a renewable, low-carbon alternative to many of the drivers of climate change. Globally, forestry is considered an integral role player in a green economic recovery: certainly, this is the case in South Africa. It is time we promoted it as such, explaining what responsible forestry looks like and how it can be part of the solution to the environmental crises we currently face,” says Heath.

In an article by the Food and Agricultural Organisation, titled Time to realise the potential of sustainable wood for the planet, the authors make a strong argument for wood as a solution to climate change, believing wood can play a key role by substituting single use plastics such as drinking straws and food packaging as part of the global movement to end plastic pollution.

Responsible forestry goes way beyond the trees. As a rural industry in South Africa, forestry creates employment and entrepreneurial opportunities in some of the country’s most impoverished communities. Through social initiatives, it delivers education, health care, infrastructure and hunger eradication programmes.

Amid the forestry landscape, countless wetland, grassland and biodiversity conservation projects are underway in the 305 000 hectares of unplanted, natural areas within forestry landholdings.

Earthday.org seeks to end plastics for the sake of human and planetary health, demanding a 60% reduction in the production of ALL plastics by 2040. According to a recent study in the journal Science Advances, around eight billion tonnes of plastic have been produced over the past six decades, 90.5% of which has not been recycled, explains Aidan Charron from EarthDay.org.

“Our reliance on plastics could be the biggest gamble in the story of human health in history. We are all ingesting and inhaling microplastics. They are everywhere. Are we just hoping they are safe, or is even the remotest possibility they might be toxic so terrifying that we can’t contemplate it?” asks Kathleen Rogers, president of EarthDay.org.

Celebrating Global Recycling Day

  • Recycling collectors sporting their new reflective shirts and sun hats.

To celebrate Global Recycling Day on Friday 18th March, the Fibre Circle has joined forces with two local packaging companies to empower 200 informal collectors with important info about paper and packaging recycling.

Fibre Circle, the producer responsibility organisation for the paper sector, has teamed up with food service and packaging producer Detpak and Remade Recycling (part of the Mpact Group) to show 200 recycling collectors that paper grocery bags and brown take-away food bags can be collected from households and sold with their waste paper collections.

The circular waste economy is a thriving network of collectors, buyers and processors, which uses recyclable material such as waste paper to make new products. Every year, more than 1.1 million tonnes of paper and paper packaging are recovered in South Africa and recycled into new products which can be recycled again and again, in many cases up to 25 times.

Paper recycling is largely based on different grades of paper. In industry speak cardboard boxes are termed ‘K4’ while used white office paper is termed ‘HL1’ (heavy letter 1). Cereal boxes, egg cartons and other similar paper items are deemed common mixed waste, or ‘CMW’.

The average consumer only needs to know whether something is recyclable or not, whereas waste collectors who sell to buy-back centres need to know exactly what they are selling and how much it is worth. It is important for the respective grades to be separated and baled together as they form the ingredients for the paper products they will be used to produce.

“Old cardboard boxes and paper bags will be re-pulped into other paper types – these will become new cardboard boxes and paper bags, and so the cycle continues,” explains Fibre Circle communications manager Samantha Choles.

Used white paper is recycled into tissue products such as toilet paper while several paper grades are recycled into common household packaging such as matchboxes, tooth paste boxes and cereal boxes.

“With paper bags now synonymous with suburban and city-based grocery deliveries after Covid kept many of us away from supermarkets, Detpak and its customers felt that it was important to close the loop with the production and recycling of paper bags,” explains Carla Breytenbach, marketing manager for Detpak.

In the run-up to World Recycling Day groups of informal waste collectors were invited to a discussion and demonstration by Anele Sololo, manager for education and SMME development at Fibre Circle, at Remade Recycling’s Midrand branch. Each collector received a pie and soft drink, along with a paper goodie bag containing a reflective T-shirt, sun hat, safety gloves, fresh fruit and a box of Smarties (in a recyclable paper box).

  • Sam, Mpact's safety mascot (left), poses with Anele Sololo, manager for education and SMME development at Fibre Circle, as she displays the types of bags that collectors can include with cardboard boxes.

“Safety and visibility is a key aspect in the lives of collectors who navigate the busy streets of our suburbs daily making an honest living,” notes Donna-Mari Noble, communications manager for the Mpact Group’s Recycling business.

Consumers are encouraged to put recyclables such as cardboard boxes, pizza boxes, grocery bags and other similar packaging on the pavement for recycling collectors.

For more information on what paper and packaging materials are recyclable, visit https://fibrecircle.co.za/promotional-material/

Other everyday materials that can be recycled include:-
Wood - Wood is renowned for being one of the most eco-friendly and sustainable materials available due to the ability of growing trees to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and store it in the wood, which can be recycled countless times. Take care, however, to ensure that the wood is sourced from sustainably managed forests in the first place, which can be verified by an FSC or PEFC label.

  • Sustainably grown timber locks up carbon dioxide extracted from the atmosphere during the growing phase and provides the raw material for countless products from telephone poles to roof trusses, furniture, counter tops, pallets, paper, packaging and fabric, and can be recycled until finally it can be discarded and will decompose back into the soil without trace!

Glass - Glass is infinitely recyclable. Made from all-natural sources such as sand, soda ash and limestone, glass never loses its purity, regardless of how many times it enters the recycling chain. The cost savings of recycling glass lies in the use of energy. Broken or waste glass melts at a lower temperature compared to making glass from raw materials for the first time. It also reduces air and water pollution in the manufacturing process.

Plastic - This material takes up to 450 years to decompose in a landfill. Plastic straws alone take up to 200 years to break down. The reason behind its slow degradation is that the materials used to produce plastic do not exist naturally. However plastic can be recycled, and may in future be used in the building sector. Plastic is strong, durable, waterproof, lightweight, easy to mould, and recyclable – all key properties for use as a construction material.

Metals - Almost all metals are recyclable with the process not impacting the material’s properties. According to the American Iron and Steel Institute, steel is the most recycled material on the planet. Other highly recyclable metals include aluminium, copper, silver, brass and gold.

Wood is King

Chris Chapman urges packaging manufacturers and consumers to kick oil-based plastic and welcome in a new world of beautiful, sustainable, versatile wood!!

Despite ongoing COVID-19 aftershocks, political brinkmanship within the corridors of power, rising poverty and crime and deteriorating service delivery at all levels of government, it’s still a damn good time to be in the forestry sector in South Africa. Or anywhere on the planet, for that matter.

In fact it may just be one of the best business arenas to be engaged in. The rising prices for sawn lumber and board across the globe are the latest indicator that the value of wood is on a long term upward trajectory.

US sawn timber prices are peaking close to the US$ 1 000 per cubic meter, and sawn lumber prices in Australia and New Zealand are soaring on the back of massive demand from China and the booming domestic construction markets. Here in South Africa the lumber market is strong and local sawmillers are enjoying a robust year – for a change.

The lumber supply in the Western Cape is holding its own but a shortage of roundlogs is looming following the massive fires in 2017 and 2018 plus the impact of government’s forestry exit strategy that has been implemented in the region.

The failure to re-capitalise the Category B and C plantations is another blot on the forest sector in South Africa, allowing precious resources to dwindle.

However the ever-increasing number of different products being produced from wood these days, plus the increasing realisation of the benefits of building in wood are all good omens for the future.

Wood plastic
Then this piece of news popped up. A US-based research team led by Prof Yuan Yao of the Yale School of the Environment and Liangbing Hu from the University of Maryland have developed a viable process for producing high quality bioplastic from wood.

This could be a game-changer as it could replace one of the world’s worst polluters – plastic.

Once regarded as a miracle invention, plastic has become the pariah of modern industrial economies. It does not biodegrade in a hurry and will continue to choke rivers, the ocean, landfills and our guts for centuries to come.

Reminds me of that classic line in The Graduate, featuring the brilliant Dustin Hoffman as a young man growing up in middle class America. At his university graduation party, a well-healed gent pulls the Dustin Hoffman character aside to offer him some sage advice about his future career choices: “I just want to say one thing to you son,” the rich gent says in typical 70s ignorance and stupidity.

“What’s that,” says Dustin, deadpan.

“Plastic!”

Remember, this was also the decade in which cigarettes were fashionable and we believed that smoking was good for you. The clever dick at the graduation party should have said another word: “Wood”!

If this technology of using wood as raw material to make plastic-like products can be perfected, there will be no excuse for packaging companies to continue to manufacture oil-based plastic. And if consumers can apply real pressure by shunning traditional plastic, we may yet have a shot at cleaning up the planet.

Either way you look at it the demand for wood is going only one way and that’s up, and we will all be better off for it.

The news that a Finnish project dubbed WISA WOODSAT is preparing to send a satellite with a plywood outer shell into space is yet another sign that Wood is King.