Paper
Cross-border trading pressures pulling at the very fabric of sustainability
In 2025, it was again difficult for the recovered paper industry to find crumbs of comfort in any aspect of its activities.
We had already grown accustomed over previous years to high levels of price volatility among the lower grades of recovered fibre, but this also became increasingly common in the higher grades during the course of last year. At the same time, we had to contend with generally lacklustre demand, significant price differences between regions, and shipping challenges that made costs and delivery times ever more difficult to predict. Tariffs and other nationalistic policy interventions served to complicate what was already a complex business environment.
It seems barely credible for a long-established, environmentally essential industry that we entered 2026 with even more headaches, not least in Europe where we wait with trepidation to see how the revised EU Waste Shipment Regulation (WSR) will impact export flows to our many customers in non-OECD countries. The revised regulation introduces onerous requirements – including permits and proof of environmentally sound treatment at destination – which could reduce traditional export flows. Even if all such requirements are met and volumes flow as before, the administrative burden and associated costs will have a major impact on exporting businesses in our sector as they expend resources in order to satify additional documentation and traceability demands.
Regulatory hurdles and the impact of the revised WSR
The imminent BIR/KPMG study into the environmental benefits of recycling will doubtless add to the existing barrage of hard facts quantifying our sector’s environmental and economic contribution. And yet, as ReMA’s Past Chair Brian Henesey told our meeting in Valencia last year, cross-border trading pressures are putting sustainability under threat by jeopardising “the finely-tuned web of global interdependence” on which our entire industry model is built and which, for decades, has allowed material to flow efficiently from where it is discarded to where it is needed.
And Julia Ettinger, Secretary General of EuRIC, questioned what would happen if Europe’s five to eight million tonnes of annual recovered paper exports were “walled off by legislation”. Certainly, preventing this structural oversupply from reaching hungry markets elsewhere would be of no benefit to the environment.
Regulations like the WSR need to include practical transition periods and clear criteria, plus technical support from authorities, to ensure markets are not severely disrupted in pursuit of environmental goals. At the same time, consistent end-of-waste criteria would help avoid needless restrictions.
Defining the criteria for a global circular economy
In this context, guest speaker Francesco Sicilia of UNIRIMA explained in Valencia that Italy had issued a decree defining the criteria for paper and board to qualify as end-of-waste, thus enabling: regulatory clarity and uniformity of rules for companies in the mechanical recycling and trade sector; standardisation of end-of-waste raw material production processes; and expanded possibilities for exclusion from the scope of the WSR. At the same event, Nuria Rubio of freight forwarder Fr. Meyer’s Sohn highlighted challenges in the shipping market and the importance of flexibility in supply chains.
Jun Park of VIPA Group told our later Bangkok meeting that new Chinese pulp rules, aimed at tackling contamination, would trigger a move to cleaner OCC. And Brian Reese of Canusa Hershman Recycling outlined the challenges facing the US OCC trade to South East Asia, including tariff pressures.
In addition to these excellent and wide-ranging presentations, our meetings last year also benefitted hugely from the market insights of past divisional President Ranjit Baxi of J&H Sales International, Simone Scaramuzzi of LCI and Tobias Umpfenbach of ALBA Wertstoff Management. They underlined some of the reasons for believing in a brighter future for our sector, including: expectations of rising packaging demand; growing middle classes and rising literacy rates in Asia, Africa and Latin America; governments’ ambitious circular economy action plans; and expansion of paper and board production facilities designed to use higher recycled contents. What’s more, our sector can never be denied the argument that we enable carbon reduction, resource efficiency and waste reduction, aligning with global climate and circularity targets.
Market drivers for a resilient paper recycling sector
But if there is going to be a robust recycling industry to capitalise on these positives, policy-makers and legislators around the world must – as a priority – position recovered paper for what it is: a strategic raw material for manufacturing, and absolutely not a waste.
“Consistent end-of-waste criteria would help avoid needless restrictions.”
Francisco J. Donoso
PRESIDENT PAPER DIVISION
IMPORTANT FACTS
Made from vegetable fibres called cellulose, paper as we know it today was first created in China more than 2000 years ago. Since the advent of the printing press in the 15th century, its use has spread across all continents to the extent that, currently, it is hard to imagine the world without this versatile material. Around 420 million tonnes of paper and cardboard are produced worldwide every year, with well over half of the raw material coming from recovered sources.
Some 50-60% of recovered paper comes from industry and business. This includes paper trimmings, cuttings and shavings from manufacturers and converters, as well as goods discarded before they reach the consumer, such as unsold newspapers and magazines. The remaining recovered fibre comes from households.
THE NEED FOR FREE TRADE
Recovered fibre collections in, notably, North America and Europe easily exceed local consumption needs and so overseas trade has become a major component of this market. But despite the environmental, social and economic advantages of the worldwide trade in recovered paper, flows have been disrupted over recent years. China established itself as the leading importer of recovered fibre, buying around 30 million tonnes per annum from overseas suppliers at one stage. However, the Chinese government has recently imposed more stringent import rules, with the result that overseas purchases are believed to have declined below 10 million tonnes in 2019 and are expected to drop still further.
Similarly restrictive import measures have also been introduced by other countries in Asia which had been leading buyers of surplus material from Europe, thus impacting the global market and creating widespread concern over the diminishing outlets for the world’s excess volumes because of a move away from the free trade principles supported by BIR.
RECYCLING PROCESSES
According to industry estimates, paper can be recycled anywhere from 3 to 8 times. Each time recycling occurs, the fibres become shorter and weaker, and virgin pulp must be introduced into paper production to maintain the strength and quality of the fibre. Through this process, recovered paper and forest-based products complement each other ecologically and economically.
The recycling of paper follows a series of steps which may vary depending on the type of paper and its degree of deterioration.
Sorting: Paper products must be separated according to their composition and degree of deterioration. Different types of paper can sometimes be mixed. Others, such as paperboard, are recycled using a single-grade process, meaning that no other type of paper can be mixed in during its processing.
Baling: Large quantities of paper are packed using hydraulic machines which apply enormous pressure to compact recovered paper into blocks that are easier and more cost-effective to transport.
Shredding: Recovered fibre is shredded into smaller pieces and mixed with water to make pulp.
Washing: The pulp is washed, refined and cleaned, then turned into a slush that undergoes filtering through screens and other separation processes to remove contaminants such as ink, clay, dirt, plastic and metals. Dyes, coatings and other additives can be introduced during this process. Water is continuously drained and cleaned for reuse.
Bleaching: In order to whiten paper, the pulp can be bleached using hydrogen peroxide and chlorine.
Pressing: The resulting paper sheet, known as “web”, is pressed between massive rollers to extract as much of the remaining water as possible and to ensure uniform smoothness and thickness. The semi-dry web is then run through heated dryer rollers to remove any remaining water.
Rolling: The finished paper is processed into large rolls ready to be manufactured again into new consumer products.
Divisional Board
