Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Simon and Schuster Greenwashing


A big round of applause to publishing giant Simon and Schuster for their new Paper Policy announced last week.

"Simon and Schuster, Inc., and its employees are committed to publishing in a manner that both respects the environment and helps to preserve the world’s great forest regions for the use and pleasure of future generations."

Sounds great right? Well lets look at some of the steps the company is going to take to fulfill this excellent vision of theirs.

1) For books printed and bound in the United States, Simon and Schuster will endeavor to eliminate (what does this mean????) the use of paper that may contain fiber from endangered and old-growth forest areas. Oh wow thats big of you. Most companies stopped that years ago. Thank you so much!!!!

2) Will increase use of recycled fiber from 10% to 25% or "greater aggregate level" by 2012 - wow excellent.

3) This is the best one: "Where economically practical and subject to its availability and Simon and Schuster's product mix " Simon and Schuster will "endeavor to have at least 10% of its paper Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified by 2012" - this is my favorite of all of their steps towards their grand goal. Lets break this down - ok, so if they can fulfill the three conditions they set on this statement then they'll increase their use of FSC paper to 10% - wow. Give me a break guys.

Their list of steps goes on and on you can read it for yourself here.

Just a tip for Simon and Schuster's future "endeavors" in greenness - guys your steps for improving shouldn't read like a legal document. You can't set conditions on your environmental policy otherwise it becomes meaningless. This is a joke. Work out a policy you can live with, without all the conditions.

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