On a day in 2000, in the small Sumatran community of Mandiangin, seventeen logging trucks arrived, accompanied by hundreds of people in black uniforms, some wearing masks.¹ The intruders attacked the local villagers with wooden bats, machetes, axes and metal rods.¹ The heart of the conflict? Logging of village forests to supply pulp mills—logging extensive enough to destroy hundreds of ancestral graves and devastate the livelihood of the indigenous community.^{1, 2}

Accounts of violence like this is part of the legacy of well-reported illegal logging practices that taint overseas paper production, but many North Americans are still unaware that their paper may be associated with stories like this.

In North America, the amount of coated paper imported from outside the continent has doubled in the last decade, creating increasing concerns about the paper’s origins.³

And rightly so. According to the American Forest and Paper Association, China, the world’s second largest paper producer after the United States,⁴ imports a large volume of logs and timber from Southeast Asia, Africa and Russia, countries known to have problems with illegal logging.⁵

With a great deal of imported paper on the market, it can be difficult for North Americans to determine the source of the paper they buy, or the origin of the fiber that went into its production. For buyers, this poses a risk that their purchases may unknowingly support illegal or unethical practices. Businesses run the risk of embarrassing or costly revelations that link them to illegal or unethical activities— jeopardizing their brands, reputations and even their revenues.

Large-Scale Destruction, Resources at Risk

China has vast paper production capacity, but doesn’t have enough fiber,⁶ and therefore relies on other sources around the globe. The American Forest and Paper Association reports that China depends on imports for well over 40% of its consumption of pulp, paper and wastepaper.⁵ Growing demand and dwindling resources indicate that the problem may get worse.

A number of recent reports suggest that illegal logging continues to be a problem in China’s paper and pulp industry. For example, 40% of its log imports from Russia are believed to be suspicious and potentially illegal.⁵

The largest source of hardwood lumber for China is from Indonesia, which suffers severely from deforestation.⁵ WALHI (Wahana Lingkungan Hidup Indonesia, or The Indonesian Forum for Environment) indicates that at least 72% of Indonesia’s natural forests have been destroyed, the highest rate of forest loss in the world.⁷