In a step toward commercializing a new eco-friendly paper – and launching a new industry in Canada – Vancouver-based Canopy has partnered with author Margaret Atwood to demonstrate the viability of its product: Second Harvest Paper.
The paper is made with straw leftover after a grain harvest plus recycled paper. This morning, Atwood and Canopy – a forest advocacy nonprofit –released a limited edition of Atwood’s new book, In Other Worlds: SF and the Human Imagination, printed on the paper.
Earlier this year, Canopy executive director Nicole Rycroft told Business in Vancouver (BIV) about plans to commercialize Second Harvest Paper as a social enterprise that would fund Canopy’s work. (See “Social finance’s “debutante ball” set for Vancouver” – Business in Vancouver; issue 1108, January 18-24.)
“A high profile initiative like printing this special edition of Margaret Atwood’s new book on Second Harvest Paper is a critical next step in our work to kick start commercial scale production of straw-based papers across North America,” Rycroft told this BIV this morning.
Rycroft said the missing link to getting such an industry going in Canada is a lack of commercial-scale pulping infrastructure.
“We have mountains of straw left over after the grain harvest every year, and we have large publishers and printers who are very keen to get their hands on this paper – in fact we’ve documented enough market demand to keep four mills running around the clock across North America,” she said.
“But we’ve just started to scratch the surface in terms of quantifying market demand.”
Rycroft said there’s a clear business case for commercializing the paper.
“It promises to spark a whole new resource sector for Canada and a number of the states in the U.S. which then creates green jobs and value-added revenues to farmers.”
Jenny Wagler
@ JennyWagler_BIV