Kimberly-Clark Continues to Flush Ancient Forests Down the Toilet
by Eric Kane, New York, NY on 11.13.06
In July, we covered a Greenpeace report that was written to expose Kimberly-Clark for using wood fiber from British Columbia’s coastal temperate rainforests and from US federal forest lands. In August, we wrote about several businesses that had decided to stop using Kimberly-Clark products for that reason. Unfortunately, neither the report nor the boycott has created the intended results. The tissue company still sources one-fifth of its global pulp from destructive logging operations in Canadian forests, including the Boreal Forest. Subsequently, Greenpeace shifted their strategy to the more theatrical methods of protest that have long since been the cornerstone of organization’s efforts. Last week, two activists suspended a banner from Kimberly-Clark’s regional headquarters in Turin, Italy that read “Stop Flushing Ancient Forests Down the Toilet”. Meanwhile, 20 others chained themselves to toilet bowls stuffed with trees outside the same office. Hopefully these latest efforts will encourage the company to revise its sourcing policies. However, in the mean time we urge our readers to discontinue using any Kimberly-Clark products. Also for more information, visit Kleercut.net.
I'm new to Treehugger, so maybe this is naive, but why isn't it good to thin out the national forests? My experience is with Colorado, where I live now and have vacationed for 20 years. Many of the forests here are at densities between 4 and 10 times what they should be according to the rangers because we don't let the fires burn. Now they're infested with beetles because they are so overpopulated. Why not allow culling (not clearcutting)?