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Paper Comanies + Clear Cutting + Phonebooks = Deforestation & Inhumane Forestry Practice

I look out my window about 4 times a year to see large yellow pages books in plastic bags thrown onto my lawn.  I just let them sit there for about, ohhh, two months or so to see what will happen.  They get a bit moldy and soggy and I’m sure if I left em there long enough they would become compost.  The deforestation practices that go into making that phone book which I did not ask for are quite inhumane.  Now I know that trying to stop a paper company by refusing a phone book doesn’t seem like it would do much good, but I feel I need to be the change that I want to see.

Clear Cutting Kills Forests for the Paper Industry.  Old growth virgin forests are basically extinct.  The paper industry is a business that looks to maximize profit and instead of utilizing renewable selective forestry techniques, the large profiteering corporations have their bottom line at the forefront of their minds.  Clear Cutting is a common practice and destroys ecosystems that have taken hundreds of years to build.

Many of these corporations are American companies.  Here are a list of them: Pulp and Paper Industry Corporations.

I have had enough of these phone books.  I just don’t have a use for them anymore. I use Google and the internet as resources now and while the phone book has it’s place, many people just don’t use them anymore.  So if you are one of those people that don’t want to receive phone books anymore, you can contact the companies and opt-out of having them delivered.

Simply call the numbers and tell them you want to opt-out of delivery.

AT&T/YellowPages (formerly SBC and Bell South):
1.800.792.2665

Verizon:
1.800.888.8448

Dex:
1.877.243.8339

Yellow Book:
1.800.373.3280 or 1.800.373.2324

The major players use a tactic called “saturation distribution” that means that you may get books even if you don’t have a land line.

(Information provided by Good Environment News Blog)

Additionally you can sign the paperless petition at http://www.paperlesspetition.org/

The Yellow Pages industry dropped 540 million printed directories this year. That’s more than one per person. With the Internet available literally in our hands, is this acceptable?

Like the printed encyclopedia, the obsolescence of the printed Yellow Pages is inevitable. However, considering that in the U.S., 97% of this $14 billion industry is derived from their print division alone, these mammoth media dinosaurs will hold on for as long as possible.

PaperlessPetition.org will expedite an end to this needless environmental waste, educate consumers on free and easy alternatives, and shed light on the growing inaccuracy of readership statistics that drive advertisers to still invest in this antiquated medium.

Recently I saw a good documentary entitled “The Great Forest” (got it from Netflix)

Three short documentaries by filmmaker Doug Hawes-Davis reveal the splendor and tragedy of the American forest, focusing on areas east of the Mississippi River. “Green Rolling Hills” questions the future of the Appalachian forests in West Virginia, Kentucky and Ohio; “Southbound” traces the migration of chip mills from the Pacific Northwest to the South; and “The Paper Colony” explores the connection between industry, land and politics in Maine.

Here’s  a trailer from one of the shorts:

Green Rolling Hills (trailer)

Other High Plains FIlms Trailers Here

Additional Readings/ Tools:

Are you getting too many catalogs?

http://www.printgreener.com/

Twelve Ways Green Your 21st Century Business

http://www.catalogchoice.org/

UPDATE 10/15/2010: I just read this article that says you can opt out of receiving the yellowbooks!  : How To Opt Out Of Yellow Book Deliveries by Lifehacker

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