Yes, data from IBIS, S&P (quoting the American Forest
& Paper
Association), and Datamonitor confirm that the US &
global pulp and paper
mill industries (NAICS 32111, 32212) are experiencing
narrowing growth,
but not a decline.
In its forecast, IBIS writes "[Decreasing capacity]
will be the result of
higher import competition in packaging papers, and flat
demand for
newsprint and writing and publications paper, due to the
increasing
popularity of electronic media. Lower capacity will further
align supply
with demand, allowing manufacturers to implement price
increases. Thus,
industry revenue will rise primarily as a result of higher
prices, rather
than increased volumes."
But such nuances can be inconvenient when a writer has
already formed a
point of view....
Sorry for the interruption in the phone book debate!
--Steve
___________________________________________________
Steve Cramer
Librarian for Accounting, Apparel, Business, &
Economics
University of North Carolina at Greensboro
smcramer uncg.edu, 336-256-0346, AIM: stevebizlib
"K.G. Schneider" <kgsbluehighways.com>
Sent by: web4lib-bounceswebjunction.org
02/11/2008 10:32 AM
To
web4libwebjunction.org
cc
web4libwebjunction.org
Subject
Re: [Web4lib] Paperless society
I always hate to break up a good discussion with the facts.
However,
paper generation has been rising for over four decades. In
the United
States, 1995-2005 showed a slowing trend, but not a
reversal. This is in
keeping with the Times' statement that worldwide, paper
usage has
"plateaued."
See:
http://
www.epa.gov/garbage/pubs/mswchar05.pdf p. 38 and passim
Note that books are a very small percentage of the total
paper waste --
on a par with grocery bags (p. 37, table 4). Corrugated
paper (as in
boxes) is *huge* -- five times that of office paper
production. That
doesn't mean that we shouldn't aggressively tackle source
reduction in
all areas -- just wanted to put into perspective that every
book
published could go digital-only and we'd still have a
massive
environmental problem caused by our appetite for paper. As
the Times
(again, accurately) reported, "The paperless office,
which some experts
had said would be the norm by the 1990s, has so far failed
to
materialize."
I'm the world's lamest reference librarian, so perhaps
someone can find
more current statistics, but a quick search for "paper
consumption
site:epa.gov" hoovered this up immediately.
K.G. Schneider
kgsfreerangelibrarian.com
(& former director, EPA Region 2 Library)
_______________________________________________
Web4lib mailing list
Web4libwebjunction.org
http://lists.we
bjunction.org/web4lib/
_______________________________________________
Web4lib mailing list
Web4libwebjunction.org
http://lists.we
bjunction.org/web4lib/
|
