Earth Equity News

Greenpeace Attacks Kimberly-Clark's for Mismanagement of Canadian Boreal Forests. Greenpeace, September 16, 2008. "Shocking new photos released [on Tuesday] reveal the existence of a massive stockpile of old-growth logs that are destined to become disposable products like Kleenex tissue and Cottonelle toilet paper for tissue giant Kimberly-Clark. The logs originate from the Ogoki Forest, the single most ecologically valuable area left in Ontario's southern Boreal Forest... The stockpile is evidence of Kimberly-Clark's egregious mismanagement of the forests despite company claims that 'much of [the] fiber from the Canadian Boreal forest comes to [Kimberly-Clark] in the form of wood pulp produced from sawdust and chips -- or leftovers -- of the lumber production process.' As these new photos and recent government correspondence reveal, Kimberly-Clark is currently purchasing huge quantities of pulp made primarily from whole, old-growth trees from intact areas of Canada's Boreal Forest. According to the Ontario Ministry of Environment, the stockpile contained 85,000 cubic metres of wood as of the end of March 2008. That's equivalent to over 7,000 logging trucks full of wood... The first industrial logging in Ogoki did not occur until 1998. For this reason, it is the most intact of all the forest management units in Ontario. Because the neighboring Kenogami Forest was managed so poorly by Kimberly-Clark and then Buchanan Forest Products, and because regeneration there has been so unsuccessful, logging company Buchanan is pushing further and further north to supply its pulp mill at Terrace Bay. The size, location, and near pristine state of the Ogoki Forest make it critical habitat for the threatened woodland caribou, while its carbon-dense trees and soils make it critical for mitigating climate change."