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Finnish Paper Deliveries Blockaded
17 April 1997
Friends of the Earth in the Netherlands yesterday blockaded a ship carrying paper from the Finnish companies ENSO and UPM-Kymmene, major suppliers of newsprint and other paper and timber to both the Netherlands and the UK. Several of the UK's major newspaper groups, including News International and Associated Newspapers, buy newsprint from ENSO.
The blockade is in protest at the ongoing logging of old growth forests in Finland, reduced to just 5% of the forest area and vital for several hundred threatened plants and animals,including the Flying Squirrel and the White-backed Woodpecker. Both companies are known to use timber from these last valuable areas (see attached map).
Friends of the Earth in the UK and the Netherlands are campaigning for these last vital forests to be saved, and urging the customers of these companies, such as the newspaper groups, to demand that their paper is guaranteed "old-growth free".
Twenty-five activists attached themselves to the Finnish ship 'Finnmaster' in the docks of IJmuiden, and held banners with the texts: 'Save the Finnish Old Growth' and 'Don't Finnish the Forests'. The ship was prevented from sailing on to Amsterdam.
Georgina Green of Friends of the Earth said:
" Paper and timber buyers in the UK should insist that their suppliers commit to a moratorium on using wood from these last vital forest areas. That is the only way these forest companies can guarantee their paper is "old-growth free". And unless they do, producers, retailers and consumers in the UK are all implicated in the destruction of these irrelaceable forests."
PICTURES OF THE ACTION ARE AVAILABLE FROM FOE NETHERLANDS
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Published by Friends of the Earth Trust
Last modified: Dec 2008
