Pittsfield, MA — Berkshires Democratic Socialists of America (Berkshires DSA) members signed a letter with the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Stand.earth, and Environment America, along with local Berkshire environmental groups, in calling on Procter & Gamble to stop its reliance on virgin forest fiber in its disposable tissue products by signing a letter to Procter & Gamble CEO David Taylor, urging him to transition Charmin and P&G’s other tissue products away from virgin forest fiber and toward recycled content and alternative fibers.
A recent report released by NRDC and Stand.earth shows that many major American toilet paper and tissue products are made with 100% virgin forest fiber and are sourced from some of the world’s last remaining intact forests, like the Canadian boreal. The Canadian boreal is a critical carbon storehouse, holding the carbon equivalent of nearly twice the world’s recoverable oil reserves in its soil. Alarmingly, roughly one million acres a year are logged in the Canadian boreal, and the wood often ends up in throwaway products like toilet paper and paper towels. Procter & Gamble is one of the biggest producers of household tissue products in the U.S. and does not use any recycled content in its tissue products, which earned products like Charmin toilet paper an F in the recent report’s scorecard. We are proud to add our organization’s name to this letter.
The DSA is the largest socialist organization in the United States. DSA’s members are building progressive movements for social change while establishing an openly democratic socialist presence in American communities and politics. We believe that working people should run both the economy and society democratically to meet human needs, not to make profits for a few. Berkshires DSA members use a variety of tactics, from legislative to direct action, to fight for reforms that empower working people.
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