The Recycler Issue 334

FEATURE
Impact of the COVID
crisis in printing
Javier Martinez, Environmental Defender at Turbon Products talks
to The Recycler about the potential environmental impacts of the
COVID pandemic.
▲ Javier Martinez, Environmental
Defender, Turbon Products
The COVID-19 crisis has hit nearly all
markets, and still, most of sectors and
players wonder when we can return to
“new normality”. In the printing sector,
many changes have happened recently.
Nevertheless, we do not know if they are
here for the long run, and a clear example
is Teleworking.
In this scenario, printing is subject to
a change, and it might well mean less
paper is used, and this can push further
digitalisation. However, moving away
from paper may have “collateral damages”,
something we also have learned about
with COVID-19.
are not too difficult to understand, screen
reading can be enough. Still, for more
complex ones, it becomes more difficult
and fatiguing. Other studies show that
people that use paper to study and take
hand notes, perform better than the ones
only using screens.
The lockdown precautions saw many
people working from home, and the
first question is: Will they all return to
the offices?
More and more it looks as if the answer
is no, and it seems clear that in the most
devastated areas some /many will not come
back to the office, at least on a daily basis.
The house prices outside the big cities
are popping up as many workers want to
move away from traffic jams and highly
crowded areas.
In this scenario, printing is subject to a change,
and it might well mean less paper is used, and this
can push further digitalisation
For example, statistics show a tremendous
increase in eye problem (myopia) under
the pandemic. For short documents that
And one may think yes but at the expense
of the environment!
While this may be true, we are in a
money-oriented economy, so if the forest
does not produce, they are abandoned,
except maybe in our National Parks.
I can share with you the case of Spanish
Mediterranean forest and especially in
Mallorca and the Balearic Islands the
fires that devastated this region. Time
ago, the forest was well kept due to a
balance between charcoal producers
and cattle owners. Charcoal producers
cleaned the bushes and the underwood
so that the cattle were able to enter, and
the grass grew.
As charcoal production was abandoned
early in the last century, the charcoal jobs
disappeared. This altered the balance and
cattle owners were impacted as more and
more as the herd could not enter the forest
to feed. At the same time paths and access
ways to the forest became denser and
more impracticable.
36 Issue 334 September 2020