2008 Paper Recycling Supplement - Welcome

Human beings have had a desire to produce paper for thousands of years, ever since determining that drawing on media beyond cave walls could have a value.

Historians estimate that Egyptians began using the papyrus reed as a type of paper scroll some 6,000 years ago. Since then, methods to mass produce paper to retain humankind’s thoughts, ideas and history have advanced in ways too numerous to cover in a brief essay.

More recently, a series of broadcast media ranging from radio and the telephone to television and the Internet has offered a variety of options for forecasters to wonder whether the demise of ink-on-paper communication is inevitable.

The marketplace has indeed in some cases selected to reduce its print product loyalty (ask publishers of daily newspapers), and the challenges for newspapers and magazines to compete with the immediacy of electronic formats will be significant.

A sector of the paper industry where old technology seems to be harder to dethrone is in the packaging segment.

The humble cardboard or paperboard box is now being mass produced in record numbers in parts of the world where box production used to be a small fraction of its 2008 levels.

As manufacturing hubs have emerged in Asia, board mills and box plants have risen in large numbers to produce accompanying boxes. Whether the boxes are exported to overseas markets or they serve as packaging for the consumer products desired by Asia’s emerging middle class, the demand for containerboard and boxboard has soared.

On container ships, in warehouses and on store shelves, the stackability, functionality and sustainability of the fiber-based box helps it remain a preferred packaging method.

Technological innovation can change the size or nature of a market instantly. Thus far in the 21st century, however, recyclable paper boxes—often made from recycled content—are proving one of the winners in the fast-paced global economy.