Could It Be This Simple … Choose the Right Toilet Paper to Save the Forests … a World Challenge!

 

Could It Be This Simple … Choose the Right Toilet Paper to Save the Forests … a World Challenge!

Who recalls the panicked run on toilet paper a few months ago when a virus became a psychological thriller to ensure your private indoor plumbing was never empty of toilet paper?

As an eco-fiction writer and keen researcher about all ecological matters, once in a while I come across an article that changed my mindset with a new implication that HEMP could save the world because toilet paper is an area that can be improved.  Read the article yourself. 

Here is what I learned that I didn’t know before which made me appreciate even more the wonder of nature itself and worry about human development of business models misaligned with Nature’s ecology’s long term consequences.  

Why Hemp makes an excellent toilet paper...

The fibers are softer than trees, naturally odorless, resistant to mold and several other fungi, have antibacterial and anti-fungal properties which ensure healthy skin. It is both durable and absorbent, absorbing four times its weight!

It is more biodegradable than any other toilet paper.

Why Hemp is better than toilet paper from a trees...

Hemp toilet paper is cheaper to make using less energy and chemicals in the process. To create paper, you only need the cellulose part of the plant. The trees contain 30% cellulose and harsh chemicals are needed to break down the plant to recover the 30%. Hemp contains up to 85% cellulose, almost three times more than trees.

Hemp produces four times more material (cellulose fibers) per acre than trees. Ten tons of hemp can be grown on an acre, making it the best biomass in the world.

Trees need 50 to 100 years before they can be harvested and turned into toilet paper. Hemp production is ready in 70 days

Hemp pulp paper can be made without any chemicals. 

Why is Hemp Better for Earth’s environment?

It can reduce landfill where a quarter of all solid waste comes from pulp and paper mills. One ton of paper pollutes 76 liters of water. (I know, I live near to a town that produces pulp and paper.)

It can also reduce recycled paper waste in landfills or incinerators … even in a digital environment, offices continue to use vast amounts of paper where paper consumption has increased by 400% in 40 years.

It can reduce toxic air waste ... if the average person uses an average of 22 kilos of toilet paper a year, then the production of pulp and paper is responsible for 20% of all toxic air waste. 

It can reduce massive deforestation to make paper, including toilet paper where 35% of trees felled are used for paper making 

Always remember that trees absorb carbon dioxide thus help to mitigate greenhouse gases produced by human activity. They play an important role in carbon sequestration, or the capture and storage of excess carbon dioxide including the soil. It is estimated that a mature tree can consume 48 pounds of carbon dioxide per year and releases enough oxygen to breathe for two years!

Sometimes a historical perspective can show the intersection between nature and business marketplace development. Before mass production, the story of toilet paper began with a variety of plants that sufficed…often dependent on status … hemp, leaves, hay, or the nearby stream.

In 1857 the first invented commercial toilet paper in the US was made from Manila hemp leaves moistened with aloe and sold as medicated toilet paper versus tearing pages from the catalog.

In 1867, the Scott brothers started making dry toilet paper from wood chips pulp that was chemically bleached with chlorine dioxide. This relatively cheap convenience soon dominated the world market and the brand Scott Paper Company remains the world's largest manufacturer and marketer of sanitary tissue products with operations in 22 countries.

Try and imagine the vast tracts of trees that were cut down for both lumber for commerce and to make toilet paper for a few cents.

Today farmers and business know that an acre of hemp can make four times as much paper as a single acre of forest in 70 days versus 50 years. 

Could it be this simple … choose the right toilet paper to save the forests

 … a world challenge!

Surely, everybody can see the logic along with environmentalists why to use hemp products as an alternative. Facts prove the logic that hemp toilet paper would save millions of trees, move towards a greener future  and help save our planet!

In fact, toilet paper, made from the industrial hemp plant, has been sold in other countries for some time. Consumers have always been the best regulators of marketplaces. Perhaps it is our turn to take the toilet paper challenge and check out hemp products’ suppliers on the internet. A small step can be as simple as replacing your regular toilet paper with hemp-based toilet paper.  

I certainly have done my due diligence and will try some Hempies!

In conclusion, the question to ask yourself is: 

If you could help save a third of the world's forests and their ecological benefits to the 

Earth, would you consider changing your sanitation habits to hemp toilet paper?

I look forward to your answers and comments. Please leave a convenient time to chat:       833 471 4661

Sincerely,

Annemarie

amarie10@gmail.com

https://helpfulmindstreamforchanges.com 

PS: Another interesting side note about the roles of business and government in using our natural environment for their personal justifications:

Who will ever know the quirk of nature that allows hemp to contain the compound tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), which can produces psychoactive effects in humans?  However, hemp has a variety of cannabis that has only small amounts of THC relative to that grown for the production of marijuana. 

In the 1930’s hemp was poised to be a billion-dollar crop with Henry Ford a big supporter, and marijuana was a common ingredient in medical products until the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 killed the growth of the industry. In 1970, President Nixon classified hemp with no current medical use and high potential for abuse in Schedules of the Controlled Substances Act and hemp  became illegal along with drugs like cocaine, heroin, and marijuana (cannabis).

In 1998, the Canadian government made marijuana legal, both in terms of recreational use and medical applications. I believe it is so important to pursue scientific studies for medical cannabis use and learn all we can about this miracle plant from Nature. 

In the meantime, long live Hempies!

 

Podcast Interview Answer # One: What values do trees or forest offer other than lumber?

Podcast Interview Answer # One:  What values do trees or forest offer other than lumber? 

How could she show her respect for a little birch tree that true self mattered as the essence of Nature’s power to share family, community and environment? Why couldn’t they understand that any being, or anybody is more than just about a brain and genes, but a whole ecosystem of connections surrounding oneself?

 Excerpt from Ecological Succession of Birchum Birch

Have you really stopped and looked at a tree? Have you checked beneath the dirt to see what makes it stand so strong? Have you used an X-ray to show how the inside organization works with both up-and-down flow of nutrients? Have you connected each leave to the sun’s energy and the inside layer of chloroplasts cells containing chlorophyll that combines the sun’s energy with carbon dioxide and water to make a carbohydrate compound, the primary source of food on Earth?

There is so much more to know about a single tree beyond beautifying our surroundings and adding cool shade and reducing wind. There is a far greater relationship to its natural environment as it provides shelter and food to a diverse collection of living things. 

Imagine what a forest of trees can provide. Forests cover more than 30% of the Earth's land surface, according to the World Wildlife Fund.

The main advantages are:

• 80% of Earth’s land animals and plants live in forests
• monitors climate change
• prevents fertile land from erosion or becoming too arid
• produces a carbohydrate compound called cellulose used to make clothes and paper (via  photosynthesis)
• supplies three-quarters of the Earth’s freshwater from its watersheds
• manufactures precious oxygen back to the air to breathe
• absorbs carbon dioxide thus helping to mitigate greenhouse gases produced by human activity
• plays an important role in carbon sequestration, or the capture and storage of excess carbon dioxide including the soil  

(Note: As a tree matures, it can consume 48 pounds of carbon dioxide per year and releases enough oxygen for you to breathe for two years!)

It's impossible to imagine a world without forests. But you don’t need to imagine a world where deforestation is increasing several dire consequences for our planet Earth and Nature’s sustainability.

Deforestation is the permanent removal of trees to make room for something else such as more agricultural land, ranching, or using the timber for construction and manufacturing.

Deforestation is seen as the second-leading cause of climate change because less carbon dioxide is removed from the air, as well as producing nearly 20% of greenhouse gas emissions. Burning fossil fuels is the first. (The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations). 

Of major concern is that jungle habitats and their animals are becoming decimated. Tropical trees are being cut down for four reasons: to make wood products, raise beef cattle, plant soy crops and grow palm oil plantations. Palm oil is cheap, versatile and commonly found in nearly half of supermarket products from crackers to lipsticks and shampoo. Even though this production is profitable for companies, it has also resulted in land grabs, social conflict, and violation of human rights.

But the restorative power of Nature will return if given a chance.  

The trees of the forest can be replanted in cleared areas or simply allow the forest ecosystem to regenerate over time as natural plant succession. In time, through the power of ecological succession plant life will reestablish, wildlife will return, water systems will reemerge, carbon will continue to be sequestered, and soils will be replenished.  

In some ways, people can do their part to limit their support for deforestation. You can buy  certified wood products, use less paper, and not consume products that use palm oil.

Of course, plant a tree when possible. If not, find a pet tree and delight in its being.

Check out  Ecological Succession of Birchum Birch

Kindle edition 

Questions and comments are always appreciated,

Annemarie

amarie10@gmail.com

1 833 471 4661 (please leave a message for best time to call back)

https://helpfulmindstreamforchanges.com

For other podcast questions check blog....

Excerpt: "Your lesson is to show others that even as a single tree you can share the spirit from a forest of trees where people can renew a sense of wonderment of peaceful co-existence.  

There is nothing to consume, nothing that money can buy, except to enjoy the splendor of trees and vibrancy of nature where everything lives, and everything dies and is taken into the soil, from fossils on up. There is order in chaos, prediction in patterns, trust in renewal, no illusion within honesty without fault or foolishness. Trees fall to the forest floor along with dead insects, animal droppings, twigs from an old squirrel’s nest, the bones of the old squirrel, all rot their way into the soil to give life again. Still you feel fascination, a place to love with a belonging that lasts beyond any generations that ensures rebirth with belonging to all.”  Ecological Succession of Birchum Birch 

...my local baby birch tree pet