Located in Canada, the North American Boreal Forest is a 10,000 year old ecosystem that represents a major source of oxygen for the planet (let alone 30% of North America's land-based oxygen). It's the world's largest carbon storehouse and the last remaining old-growth forest throughout the Americas. Beautiful, right? And guess what? The Boreal makes up 20% of the world's surviving ancient forests, providing a home to 5 indigenous tribes, half of North America's songbirds, as well as wildlands for endangered species like the lynx, caribou and wolverine.
And what's wrong? A whole lot when we examine Kimberly-Clark's actions. KC is the maker of home-bound products like Kleenex, Scott, Cottonelle, Huggies, Depends, Kotex and the like. It's headquarters are based in Irving, Texas and CEO Thomas Falk averages an annual salary of $20 billion by being the source of 60% of the world's
one-time use paper products. How does he do it? How does Kimberly-Clark make its revenue on the cheap? By clear-cutting 1.5 million acres of the North American Boreal Forest and choosing 99% virgin fiber to make its products. Zero percent are post-consumer recycled and only 1% of its Kleenex boxes are recycled. Breaking the numbers down, that comes to 4,000 acres of clear-cutting per day, or 3 acres per minute. Ouch!
Earth Day approaches. Become a member of
Greenpeace today and celebrate this magnificent planet by making every day Earth Day. It's now up to the people to be the power in numbers behind preserving, conserving and saving our planet, letting Kimberly-Clark CEO Thomas Falk know that we want 30-40% of its products made from post-consumer recycles and to urge them to use "fresh trees" from Forest Stewardship Council regulated tree farms.
