After growing for some 30 years, trees are fairly close together, so you thin one so the other two have room and sunlight to grow. “You assume that one of the seedlings will die naturally. “For every mature tree that is harvested four new ones are planted,” Moisio says. Emilia Moisio gives an example of how forests are managed in Finland. Consumers are more aware of these issues and most customers have strict sustainability requirements like traceability of wood and different certificates for any wood pulp they use for their end products. The sustainable management of forests is of utmost importance. “From the hardwood species, eucalyptus is considered to provide very good softness and is considered as the best suitable wood species for soft tissue paper.” “In the pulp and paper industry softwood is especially wanted for its strength properties, for instance in packaging papers,” says Petäjä. Generally, softwood and hardwood fibres are blended in different proportions, depending upon the end product. Their fibres are shorter which gives the product softness, so hardwood pulp is often used for tissue papers. Leafy trees like birch and eucalyptus are hardwood. Softwood also increases absorbency and is used for absorbent products such as paper towels, baby diapers and other hygiene products. The long fibres give it strength, so softwood pulp is often used to create sturdy products. “For instance, softwood gives different properties than hardwood.”Ĭonifers like pine and spruce are softwood trees. “The type of wood, the wood species, determines the quality and properties of the pulp made from it and defines how suitable the pulp is for different products,” Petäjä continues. Yet before we talk about what we can do with wood pulp we should begin where it comes from: the forest. Each has different requirements for the fibres, depending upon the end product”, says Emilia Moisio, Director of UPM's Sustainable Fiber project. They are tissue, printing and writing papers, board and specialty papers. “We can consider four main end uses for wood pulp. Wood pulp is a versatile material used for a wide variety of products. “If we think simply, there would be no printing or writing paper, no newspapers, magazines or books, no paper- or board-based packaging and no toilet paper or other tissue products,” says Pirkko Petäjä, Principal of Pöyry Management Consulting. If pulp disappeared, life would be very different. If you want to get an idea of how important something is, imagine what life would be like without it.
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