ICT and e-Business in the Pulp, Paper and Paper ... - empirica

Pulp, paper and paper products
In summary, these figures show that circulation has declined over a five-year period in
most European countries and in the USA, but not in a dramatic way. While the European
and US newspaper markets are saturated, circulation increases in emerging economies.
Thus, overall global newspaper circulation has increased by nearly 5% over the past 5
years.
Additional demand effects of the internet
Outlook
In addition to enabling substitution, the internet also creates new demand for printing
paper. A recent survey among 617 Swiss companies about their demand for paper found
that consumption had increased by about 20% from 2000 to 2005. 109 Growth was
particularly high among large enterprises, although the digital saving and archiving of
data has increased by a factor of four in the same time. While 70% of firms said that the
vision of the "paperless office" has some relevance for them, and also about 70% of the
firms interviewed said that they used software systems for document management;
however, this has not translated into a reduced demand for paper.
This Swiss finding is quite interesting, as it indicates that there is no inverse correlation
between increasing digitisation and the demand for paper in business. In essence, the
amount of information which is required, used and processed by companies for
management and other purposes has substantially increased; in practical terms this
means that the increased saving and archiving of digital data and an increased level of
printing hardcopy reports and documents have occurred in parallel.
An earlier survey among German internet users by Ipsos on behalf of Minolta in 2000
found that 18% of the total population consumed considerably more paper due to using
the internet than before, mainly because of printing out web pages. Not even e-mails help
to reduce paper, according to the survey, because users like to print out e-mails. Only
about 7% of users said that they would read e-mails entirely on the screen. 110 Since
internet access has considerably increased since then, the impact on increased paper
consumption in households and offices can easily be imagined.
Similar evidence was reported for the USA, where a study by Hewlett-Packard (HP)
found that about a third of managers interviewed said that demand for printing documents
had considerably increased due to the internet. 111
Europe currently consumes 205kg of paper per capita, four times the world average. In
total, European countries consume 80 million tonnes of paper each year, 25% of world
consumption. Some projections by industry show per capita paper consumption growing
significantly in the next 10 years. 112
109 "Steigender Papierverbrauch trotz Digitalisierung", 5 April 2006, news.ch. See: www.news.ch
(download in April 2006)
110 "Das Internet erhöht den Papierverbrauch", heise online, 27 July 2000,
www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/10889 (download in April 2006)
111 ibid
112 Source: Jaakko Poyry. Quoted from "A Common Vision for Transforming the European Paper
Industry", Vision paper signed by 50 NGOs on 27 Jan. 2006, Frankfurt. See:
www.taigarescue.org (accessed in April 2006).
152