| Double A sets a new standard for the paper production industry
Thailand’s Advance Agro Public Company Limited is a leading ‘green’ paper producer in the Asia Pacific region. Double A paper, its paper brand, is sold in over 100 countries and its market expansion is expected to continue (Double A began selling its paper in the US earlier this year). Besides its commercial successes, the unique and environmentally friendly manufacturing process makes the company different from its competitors in the paper industry. On 5th Jun 08, at the opening ceremony of the Double A RE-Live! @ Atrium (an 11-day environmental carnival by youth), I sat down with Mr. Thirawit Leetavorn, Double A’s Senior Executive Vice President, to find out more about Double A’s environmentally friendly initiatives and how they spread their green message around the globe.
Would it be accurate to say that Double A is a carbon-neutral firm? Could you tell me more about Double A’s initiatives and processes in promoting sustainable development?
In terms of emissions, the Double A process is designed so that any carbon emissions created will be absorbed by the trees that we plant and harvest. All the water we use in our production process comes from rain water collected in our purpose-built reservoir, and our paper mills are powered by electricity produced with waste (biomass) from the chopped trees. This means we don’t have to get water from natural lakes and rivers and we do not have to buy diesel. We actually generate surplus amounts of energy from the biomass fuel we have, and that is sold to the local power grid. With 1.5 million farmers in Thailand growing over approximately 150 million Double A paper trees, even though our mill discharges limited amounts of CO2 emissions, the large number of trees offsets any pollution our production process creates. We commissioned a well-known Australian research company to study the environmental cost of paper production and they found that the impact recycled paper has on the environment is 9 cents (AUD) per ream, whereas the environmental impact of our paper is only 4 cents (AUD) per ream. This difference comes from our stages of production, which have been developed to complement one another and minimize resource usage. For example, our mill uses only a tenth of the water that most other paper manufacturers use. The only truly external inputs which we utilize are the chemicals that act as paper fillers. Yet when compared to the industry standard, we still use only nominal amounts of chemicals.
Does it take a long time to develop quality environmentally-friendly paper?
Yes. First, the work starts with the raw material source. There are two types of paper you can use: short fibre paper and long fibre paper. But the problem with long fibre pulp is that the texture of the paper will be very coarse. We’re the only producers who use a high concentration (90%) of short fibre pulp, which makes our paper very smooth. And by doing so, we can guarantee our customers an almost zero jam rate when using Double A paper. We test our paper on a number of machines, running 150 copies per minute - a very high rate - and our paper runs exceptionally well through the machines. Not too many papers can actually perform like that.
In addition, after sourcing the best fibre to produce the fine and smooth paper, Double A came up with the environmental friendly concept of Farmed Trees. This means that trees are planted in the unused spaces between the Thai farmers’ rice, sugarcane, cassava, corn and tapioca crops, and no land clearing takes place to plant or harvest Double A’s Farmed Trees.
Suppose I’m a consumer looking for printing paper. The way you market your paper- do you explicitly label the processes involved in producing Double A paper? Do you think if buyers were to see all these processes involved, then they would be more likely to buy the Double A brand?
Unfortunately, when most people buy paper, the two main things they look at are quality and price. Then they may consider the relevant environmental issues. We are the only paper company that has been willing to come out and talk about the way we make our paper. An Australian industry expert once commented to me that “it is very brave of Double A” to openly share our production methods. We definitely need to talk more about our production methods, but those alone will not be able to convince consumers.
Events like today [RE-Live!] are very good because they are part of the whole environmental awareness package that we are pushing. We’d like to see more events similar to ‘Re-live!’. Double A enjoys working with students; we encourage them to come up with projects like ‘Re-live!’ and in turn, we support the projects because to us, that’s the way to get the message out. Students are a bit more passionate about these issues and their motives are very clear. Double A’s message is not a simple one; when you first read the Double A production processes, you must have thought “wow, ok, the reservoir, then the pulping process, then the biomass... what is this biomass?” It’s not an easy and brief message to print on our product packaging, and most shoppers will not spend 5 minutes reading about a company’s production technique. If you want to learn more about our products, it’s through your own efforts. Hopefully consumers will look at our label and want to learn more about our message.
To send your message to a broader audience, do you sponsor any student groups or school campuses with Double A paper? How about stationery stores?
Currently, we don’t sponsor any student groups. Part of Double A’s philosophy is that we believe it’s best to help people to help themselves. For instance, if you had a student store and wish to sell Double A paper, we would allow you to sell it properly and then any profits we earn from the paper would be given back to the student group. We have done these kinds of initiatives in universities throughout Taiwan and Thailand. In terms of retail outlets such as stationery stores, we have Double A copying centres throughout Singapore and Southeast Asia and supply many private enterprises with paper products.
How would Double A encourage young paper users to be responsible in their usage?
The fact of the matter is, you’re never going to get to a paperless world. Paper will always be used and we anticipate paper consumption to grow around 3-4% per year. Taking that into consideration, youths have to make the right choice. The way Double A produces paper using farmed trees is a sustainable choice. So make the right choice and reuse paper. Ensure that you choose the double-sided printing option which our brand is good for.
To conclude, if there were a piece of advice you could give to youths like me, what would it be?
First, I would encourage everyone to pledge the “7 Easy Green Habits,” which are simple, everyday methods to become more environmentally friendly. Second, I would encourage everyone to get involved with an environmental cause. And of course, I would tell youths to choose the right type of paper from an environment standpoint: Double A paper.
The 7 Easy Green Habits are:
- Taking public transport
- Using refillable stationery
- Rejecting and reusing plastic bags
- Turning off electrical appliances completely off instead of standby mode
- Recycling paper
- Cutting down the use of water heaters
- Changing from air-con to fan, or setting the air-con temperature at 25 degrees or above.)
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