With 30 per cent of the world’s trees cut down being used for paper products, essential business printing needs to do more than minimise paper waste. We need to maximise positive environmental investment 01732 759725 30 Q&A Following the recent launch of PaperCut Grows, Michelle Ryder caught up with Program Manager Jamie McClunie, to learn more about the drivers for this sustainability initiative PaperCut Grows MR: What led you to creating this PaperCut Grows program? JMC: PaperCut has always been about looking after the environment. Our cofounder Chris Dance was solving print waste at a high school when he made the decision to create PaperCut. It was the motivation to write a bit of code to reduce waste for one school, and it quickly became a globally used software. To date, our solutions have saved 2.3B pages and over 280,000 trees and counting. MR: How does PaperCut Grows work? JMC: PaperCut customers simply join as part of their licence with PaperCut MF or PaperCut Hive. They then make a tree planting investment up-front per printer. We calculate and convert how much they print into how many trees they should purchase for their printing to be Forest Positive. After they reach the initial amount of time calculated, they then reinvest when they approach the end of the number of trees planted. MR: How does PaperCut Grows differ from other sustainability initiatives? JMC: Probably the most obvious difference is our focus on creating Forest Positive outcomes. We’ve been saving trees for as long as we’ve been building software, now we’re solving the second half of the print equation. The equation’s pretty simple: after reducing waste, how do you give back more? We decided that we should facilitate the planting of more trees than a user consumes in their printing. We base that on research that suggests around 8,500 sheets of A4 paper come from a tree. So, we’re planting a tree every time a customer has consumed 8,000 sheets. It’s a simple equation that ensures a customer can be Forest Positive when they print using PaperCut Grows. MR: Who does the planting? JMC: We’re the print experts, so we handle the calculations and conversions as part of our print management functionality. We leave the tree planting to the ecological experts, our non-profit reforestation partner, One Tree Planted. MR: Where do the trees get planted? JMC: Tree planting takes place around the world. The program allows customers to select up to three locations. Customers can choose the locations themselves or leave it to the wise folk at One Tree Planted to choose. MR: How much money does PaperCut make from this program? JMC: A fair question. We don’t make any profit from PaperCut Grows. Our intention is to facilitate a positive impact on the environment on behalf of our customers. We will never attempt to make profit from this endeavour. MR: I have to ask... is this greenwashing packaged up in a fancy slogan? JMC: I hope people don’t see it as such. We firmly believe in our equation of growing more trees than are consumed in printing. That’s the practical outcome of this program. MR: How do you join PaperCut Grows? JMC:The PaperCut Grows program is available with a licence for PaperCut MF and PaperCut Hive. To sign up as an existing or new customer, we advise speaking to one of our Authorised Solution Centres. www.papercut.com Michelle Ryder (MR): What is PaperCut Grows? Jamie McClunie (JMC): PaperCut Grows is a sustainability program that enables our customers to do more than reduce waste, and actively invest in the forests of the world. PaperCut MF and PaperCut Hive continue to handle the print waste reduction side of things. Now we provide customers with a tool to make their printing Forest Positive with the PaperCut Grows program. MR: What do you mean by Forest Positive printing? JMC: The Forest Positive movement is an evolution of business sustainability. It’s about responsible stewardship to sustain our forests, whether we’re using them for construction lumber, harvesting food and medicines, or making wood pulp for printer paper. Forest Positive business practices directly invest in the forests of the world, putting back more than we use. This is vital to fight global warming because trees are our number one way of combating climate change and greenhouse gas emissions. 20 per cent of current greenhouse gases are due to tropical forest destruction. One mature tree absorbs more than 48 pounds of carbon dioxide each year. This creates enough oxygen for a human to breathe for two years. Reducing print waste with PaperCut MF or PaperCut Hive and joining PaperCut Grows makes a workplace’s printing Forest Positive, by reducing waste and more than replacing the trees their printing consumes. Unfortunately, due to climate change and deforestation, the number of trees on the planet is shrinking every day. With 30 per cent of the world’s trees cut down being used for paper products, essential business printing needs to do more than minimise paper waste. We need to maximise positive environmental investment. Jamie McClunie
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy NDUxNDM=