Did You Know?

Topic of the Week – Paper

1. To start with, around 100 B.C., the Chinese invented paper from hemp. They later began to use tree bark, bamboo, and other plant fibers to create paper.
2. We derived the English word “paper” from the Egyptian word “papyrus”.
3.  Each ton of recycled paper can avoid the use of 17 trees and 26,500 liters of water.
4. The US consumes more than 30% of all paper products globally, despite being only 5% of the world’s population.
5. Americans use more than 90 million short tons of paper and paperboard every year.
6. Chinese were the first nation in the world who started producing paper by hand. This happened almost 2000 years ago.
7. The oldest surviving trace of papyrus comes from 3000 BC Egypt.
8. Watermarks on paper were first used in 13th century Italy.
9. Paper came to Europe via Arab traders who learned its secrets from the Chinese.
10. The machine that extracts and prepares tree fibers for papermaking is called Hollander.
11. Recycling one ton of paper saves 17 trees!
12. The largest producers of paper by quantity in the world are the US and Canada. After them come Finland, Japan, and Sweden.
13. The largest producer of paper by volume is not America, but China. As of 2011, they have a 24.9% market share of paper production, with the US having 18.8%.
14. In 1999 average American came in contact with approximately 354 kg of paper.
15. City of Phoenix, USA, manages to collect around 100 thousand tons of recycled material per year, and 75% of it is paper.
16. Toilet paper started being produced in late 9th century China.
17. The use of paper is growing with each passing year.
18. The oldest European document written on paper comes from 1109. It was a deed of Sicilian king King Roger II written in Greek and Arabic.
19. 42% of the industrial wood industry is dedicated to paper production.
20. 37% of US paper pulp comes from recycled paper.
21. Paper industry is the 4th largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions in the US.
22. In the last 200 years, 50% of Earth’s forests were cleared or burned.
23. Every day Americans buy around 62 million newspapers and throw out around 44 million of them.
24. During its lifetime, one American citizen uses 465 trees for their paper needs.
25. Around 73% of every landfill is paper and cardboard boxes.
26. The first American paper mill was established in 1690.
27. The first book that was printed from an industrially made paper was produced in 1804.