7th March 2013, London, UK – A resolution placed before the US Senate seeks to reverse recent federal initiatives to eliminate paper-based information

‘Consumers for Paper Options’, a US group set up to challenge the drive towards a digital only society, applauds the resolution

Originally reported by Industry Intelligence, 5th March 2013

The resolution, introduced by U.S. Reps. Duffy & Michaud, says Agencies Should Continue to Provide Americans with Paper Options for Social Security Benefits, Savings Bonds, Tax Forms & Other Services

‘Consumers for Paper Options’, a coalition of individuals and organizations advocating for the right to paper-based communications, today applauded a new Congressional resolution to protect access to paper-based options for government services and information. This bipartisan resolution (H.Res. 97), introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives by Reps. Sean Duffy (R-Wis.) and Mike Michaud (D-Maine), seeks to reverse recent federal initiatives to completely eliminate paper-based information and services, such as Social Security checks and earnings statements, savings bonds and income tax forms.

Federal agencies have been forcing Americans to go “paperless” without public comment or Congressional oversight, despite the fact that millions of Americans cannot access information in electronic formats and cybersecurity threats are on the rise. The Duffy-Michaud resolution seeks to bring these agency decisions under Congressional review, while directing the federal government to ensure that Americans receive paper information and services, unless they specifically choose electronic-only.

“Federal efforts to eliminate paper-based services and information are disenfranchising millions of Americans, including senior citizens, lower income Americans and those who are concerned about cyber-threats,” said John Runyan, executive director of Consumers for Paper Options. “More than 30 million American households lack Internet access both at home and at work, and yet our government expects all citizens to e-file tax forms, manage their finances online and purchase savings bonds electronically.“

Runyan continued, “It’s time for Congress to step in and protect equal and appropriate information access for all Americans. We are pleased to see Reps. Duffy and Michaud leading the charge to make federal agencies accountable for their decisions, and to defend the right for Americans to receive government information in whatever means they choose. The federal government has a duty to serve every citizen, regardless of which side of the digital divide they inhabit.”

Martyn Eustace, Director of Two Sides, comments, ‘Consumers for Paper Options’ has done a great job in the US to highlight the growing tendency of Government departments and large organisations to drive unwilling consumers down a digital path whereas, in reality, research shows that consumers prefer to read from paper and value paper based communication above digital.

We also know that many consumers print out their bills for security so the term ‘going paperless’ is totally misleading. E billing and other digital communications are often promoted as environmentally friendly. There is significant evidence that this is just not true.

There is clearly a need to present the facts to large UK organisations, including Government, and discussions are continuing about launching a similar UK initiative in the very near future”.

ENDS

About Consumers for Paper Options

Consumers for Paper Options is a coalition of individuals and organizations who believe paper-based communications are critically important for millions of Americans, especially seniors and the 30 percent of Americans without Internet access. While regulated entities and governments at every level need to streamline services, cut costs and improve efficiencies, preserving paper-based options for information and essential services for those who need or want them should remain a crucial priority. The goal of Consumers for Paper Options is to preserve access to information in a way that neither hinders the natural evolution of technology nor discriminates against those who may not, or cannot, use it. For more information, visit www.paperoptions.org.

About Two Sides

Two Sides is an initiative by companies from the Graphic Communication Value Chain including forestry, pulp, paper, inks and chemicals, pre press, press, finishing, publishing and printing. Membership spans Europe, the United States and Australia. Our common goal is to promote the responsible production and use of print and paper, and dispel common environmental misconceptions by providing users with verifiable information on why print and paper is an attractive, practical and sustainable communications medium. www.twosides.info

Contacts:
Two Sides

Martyn Eustace     e: mje@twosides.info
Sonya Sanghera    e: sks@twosides.info
Sarah Collins    e: sjc@twosides.info
t: 00 44 1327 262920

The post US senate to reconsider the elimination of paper based communication first appeared on The Paper Story (PAMSA).

Press release from the issuing company

“Toshiba may have meant well when it attempted to publicize its ‘print leaner and greener’ initiative with a ‘National No-Print Day’ campaign, but it was well off base when it pointed a finger at print as an anti-tree medium,” said National Association for Printing Leadership (NAPL) President and Chief Executive Officer Joseph P. Truncale, Ph.D. “Despite this all-too-often repeated anti-print “save a tree” refrain, print and paper are simply not enemies of the environment.

“Reading a book on a tablet may be convenient, but it is not more environmentally friendly than reading a printed copy,” he continued. “Paying a bill online may be quicker, but it is not better for the woodlands than paying it by check. Why? Because paper is a renewable, recyclable, and biodegradable resource, while computers and other electronic devices are comprised primarily of one-time-use only metals and hydrocarbon-based materials, and they require energy created principally through the use of other non-renewable resources.”

NAPL has long pointed out that paper production uses trees, but it does not destroy forests. Paper companies depend on trees for their business, so they plant more trees than they harvest each year, carefully managing forests on privately owned lands for maximum tree growth and production.

In fact, despite the billions of sheets of paper that have been produced, the United States has about 12 million more acres of forest land now than it did a quarter of a century ago, and overall forest inventory has increased 49% over the last half-century. Every day, more than 1.7 million trees are planted in the U.S., nearly half of them (45%) by the forest products industry. You might say that every printed page helps plant a tree. By comparison, according to Time magazine, more than 130,000 computers are discarded by Americans every day.

The problem at landfills is not paper, which is recycled at very high levels, providing many towns and cities with an important income source. The real waste problem is the rapidly escalating number of discarded computers and other electronic components, which are not biodegradable and will sit in landfills for generations, taking up increasing amounts of space and ultimately leaching lead, mercury, and other toxic metals, hazardous chemicals, and plastic residue into the soil. Electronics now make up the fastest-growing part of the U.S. waste stream.

Everyone in the printing industry has the same interest as Toshiba in making our processes as environmentally friendly as possible, and we have all been working toward that goal for decades. Witness, for example, the growth of forest-certification and chain-of-custody programs, the new technologies that increase the paper yield per trees—in some cases, 90,000 sheets from a single cord of wood, and the use of renewable biomass fuels to power paper manufacturing—since 1990, purchased energy and fossil fuel use per ton of paper production has been cut by 26%.

As NAPL stated in an article two years ago, “The environmental impact of any communications process generally occurs at one or more of three stages: the creation of the medium being used for the message, the transmission of the message, and the conclusion or aftermath of the process. At each point, paper-based communications have a less injurious environmental effect than their electronic counterpart. Print and electronic media will coexist in the future and complement each other’s strengths. And one of paper‘s undeniable strengths is its position as an environmentally friendly messaging medium.”

Whatever Toshiba’s well-intentioned environmental goals may be,” said Truncale, “it is simply short-sighted and wrong-headed to suggest that the environment is harmed by the use of paper and printing.”

In Brief:

• Paper is a renewable resource, grown and replenished in managed forests; the precious metals and hydrocarbons required to create computers and other electronic devices are not—they require mining and drilling that can damage the surrounding ecosystem, and when they have been removed from the earth, they are gone forever.
• Paper is recyclable—nearly two-thirds of U.S. paper consumed is now recovered—and much is reused, more than one-third of the world’s total fiber supply now coming from recycled paper; computer components are used once—often after just a few years of rapid obsolescence—and then this toxic e-waste is discarded in landfills or shipped to developing countries.
• Paper requires only sunlight or the power of a single light bulb to be read and used; computers require a continuous stream of electricity generated predominantly by non-renewable fossil fuel energy sources. In 2006, for example, Internet data servers alone purchased twice the amount of energy purchased by the U.S. pulp and paper industry.

The post NAPL: Toshiba ‘No-Print Day’ Campaign Points Wrongful Finger at Print first appeared on The Paper Story (PAMSA).