Caught short: lack of recycled toilet paper in UK ‘fuelling deforestation’

Hoarding during the Covid-19 pandemic underlined just how important loo roll is to the British public. But working from home had another unexpected effect: less waste paper from offices, which means less recycled material to make toilet roll.

New research by Ethical Consumer magazine shows that the three main toilet brands have cut the amount of recycled paper in their tissues. It said the use of virgin wood pulp was fuelling deforestation, although paper-industry advocates dispute this.

The consumer organisation recommended that people avoid buying Andrex, Velvet, Cushelle, Regina and Nicky because more material used to make them is taken from felled trees.

It found that Kimberly-Clark, which makes Andrex, cut the amount of recycled fibre it uses for tissue and personalcare products to 19.3% in 2021, down from 29.7% in 2011.

It used less fibre, down from 3.53m tonnes to 2.85m, but almost all the reduction was in recycled fibres, while virgin-pulp use fell only slightly.

Sofidel, maker of Regina and Nicky, cut recycled fibres from 8.9% in 2019 to 7.3% in 2021.

And Essity, which makes Velvet and Cushelle, cut the amount of recycled paper in its products from 2.1m tonnes in 2018 (40%) to 1.9m tonnes in 2022 (36%) while it increased slightly the amount of fibre taken from pulp.

Shanta Bhavnani, a researcher at Ethical Consumer and the author of the report, said: “There’s so much awareness now of the importance of trees in addressing climate change so it’s really disappointing to see the big toilet paper companies cutting their use of recycled fibres.

“But it’s encouraging to see the growth in the number of alternative toilet paper products, as it means consumers now have many more sustainable options.”

She cited a report by the Natural Resources Defense Council, a US environmental body, that said logging in the northern hemisphere was having an impact on Canada’s boreal forests, with 11.3m hectares (28m acres) of forest felled from 1996 to 2015 – almost the size of England.

Recycling is more efficient than cutting down trees as it produces less wastewater and other waste and requires less energy, according to the Environmental Paper Network, a global coalition of more than 150 civil society organisations, which also says that making tissue from recycled paper uses one-third of the greenhouse gas emissions of virgin wood.

However, Two Sides, a membership organisation for forestry, pulp and other paper manufacturers, said that it was misleading to say paper production contributed to deforestation since “all trees used for making paper products are replanted”.

It said European forests had grown from 2005 to 2015 and 74% of all paper used in Europe was recycled.

It added that virgin pulp was required to maintain the recycling chain, as fibres degrade over time, so that paper can be recycled 3.8 times on average, though others say fibres can last up to six times or more.

All three companies named in the report take virgin wood from certified schemes like the Forestry Stewardship Council (FSC). But Ethical Consumer said these schemes had previously suffered from poor oversight and labels such as “FSC mix” were from forests that were not audited.

It recommended that people buy toilet roll made from recycled paper or sustainably sourced bamboo pulp with no plastic packaging.

Gareth Lucy, Essity UK’s communications director, said that he was disappointed by the report because there had been a big drop in the availability of waste paper during the pandemic – “from the huge reduction in office paper waste as workplaces were closed, and the transition of household bills and documents from paper to online”.

He added that Essity had been researching how to make tissue from other sources such as wheat straw. “Essity has identified and developed ways to process new sources of recycled paper, such as from used paper towels and takeaway coffee cups, and has invested in a new state-of-the-art recycled paper facility that can process a lower grade of recycle fibre.”

A Kimberly-Clark spokesperson said it was aiming to end the use of natural forest fibre by 2030 and that its UK operation uses 77% fast-growing, farmed eucalyptus fibres.

“Of the remaining 23%, we’re working towards reducing them further through the use of innovative technology, for example using enzymes to give the tissue paper the necessary strength” the spokesperson said.

Sofidel was contacted but declined to comment.