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About USD 78 bn in investments over the next decade could help shift the paper, packaging, and textile industries towards profitable and sustainable supply chains, according to a COP16 panel by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and NGO Canopy Planet. The investment would scale circular Next Gen supply chains.
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Why does this matter? Over five bn trees are harvested annually for paper and textile production, contributing to habitat degradation and biodiversity loss. The focus is on replacing wood fibers with low-impact, non-wood inputs such as textile and food waste and agricultural residues, which could lead to substantial conservation gains for forests and biodiversity.
What does Next Gen do? Next Gen Solutions is a Canopy initiative that leverages by-products from other industries to produce paper, packaging materials, and textiles, eliminating the need to rely on forests. It aims to mobilize over 60 mn tons of these Next Gen alternatives by 2033, with the goal of cutting This initiative will alleviate pressure on forests and create opportunities for locally focused conservation efforts.
One solution by Next Gen solutions proposes using nearly 1 bn tons of accessible cellulosic waste, like wheat straw and discarded textiles, to create circular packaging and clothing. In China, UK’s Nafici Group adopted Next Gen technology to create packaging from wheat straw and reeds rather than vital forests. In Sweden, Renewcell — a textile-to-textile recycling company — embraced the NGO’s tech that uses mns of old jeans and t-shirts rather than forests to produce rayon and lyocell textile for new clothes.
The potential is high: Next Gen says that it has a pipeline of already scalable alternative materials that, given the right amount of investments, could cut dependency on forest-extracted fibers by a third, which could lower the industry’s impact on biodiversity by fivefold.
