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Paper Consumption and Environmental Impact in an Emerging Economy

Received: 27 October 2016     Accepted: 8 November 2016     Published: 2 December 2016
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Abstract

Some 25 years ago, it was thought that the use of paper would decrease with increasing digital technology but it has rather increased through the printing of emails, web pages and reports. In addition, the use of paper for packaging, facial and toilet tissue products as well as newspapers, shows how important paper usage has become. Emerging economies like Cameroon, rely on imported and locally produced paper and paper products with no available paper recycling opportunities leading to significant discernible environmental impacts such as pollution, increased deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions. This study used a life cycle analysis (LCA) to ascertain paper consumption and its ensuing environmental impacts in Buea District of south west Cameroon. It observed that, over 1087919kg of paper are consumed annually. The study concluded that, the digitalization of government and para-public services is necessary to curb this upsurge of paper use as well as reduce the resulting environmental impact.

Published in Journal of Energy, Environmental & Chemical Engineering (Volume 1, Issue 1)
DOI 10.11648/j.jeece.20160101.12
Page(s) 13-18
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2016. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Environmental Impact, Paper, Recycling, Forests, Buea

References
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Cite This Article
  • APA Style

    Mukete Beckline, Sun Yujun, Zama Eric, Monono Samuel Kato. (2016). Paper Consumption and Environmental Impact in an Emerging Economy. Journal of Energy, Environmental & Chemical Engineering, 1(1), 13-18. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.jeece.20160101.12

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    ACS Style

    Mukete Beckline; Sun Yujun; Zama Eric; Monono Samuel Kato. Paper Consumption and Environmental Impact in an Emerging Economy. J. Energy Environ. Chem. Eng. 2016, 1(1), 13-18. doi: 10.11648/j.jeece.20160101.12

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    AMA Style

    Mukete Beckline, Sun Yujun, Zama Eric, Monono Samuel Kato. Paper Consumption and Environmental Impact in an Emerging Economy. J Energy Environ Chem Eng. 2016;1(1):13-18. doi: 10.11648/j.jeece.20160101.12

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  • @article{10.11648/j.jeece.20160101.12,
      author = {Mukete Beckline and Sun Yujun and Zama Eric and Monono Samuel Kato},
      title = {Paper Consumption and Environmental Impact in an Emerging Economy},
      journal = {Journal of Energy, Environmental & Chemical Engineering},
      volume = {1},
      number = {1},
      pages = {13-18},
      doi = {10.11648/j.jeece.20160101.12},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.jeece.20160101.12},
      eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.jeece.20160101.12},
      abstract = {Some 25 years ago, it was thought that the use of paper would decrease with increasing digital technology but it has rather increased through the printing of emails, web pages and reports. In addition, the use of paper for packaging, facial and toilet tissue products as well as newspapers, shows how important paper usage has become. Emerging economies like Cameroon, rely on imported and locally produced paper and paper products with no available paper recycling opportunities leading to significant discernible environmental impacts such as pollution, increased deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions. This study used a life cycle analysis (LCA) to ascertain paper consumption and its ensuing environmental impacts in Buea District of south west Cameroon. It observed that, over 1087919kg of paper are consumed annually. The study concluded that, the digitalization of government and para-public services is necessary to curb this upsurge of paper use as well as reduce the resulting environmental impact.},
     year = {2016}
    }
    

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    T1  - Paper Consumption and Environmental Impact in an Emerging Economy
    AU  - Mukete Beckline
    AU  - Sun Yujun
    AU  - Zama Eric
    AU  - Monono Samuel Kato
    Y1  - 2016/12/02
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    T2  - Journal of Energy, Environmental & Chemical Engineering
    JF  - Journal of Energy, Environmental & Chemical Engineering
    JO  - Journal of Energy, Environmental & Chemical Engineering
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    UR  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.jeece.20160101.12
    AB  - Some 25 years ago, it was thought that the use of paper would decrease with increasing digital technology but it has rather increased through the printing of emails, web pages and reports. In addition, the use of paper for packaging, facial and toilet tissue products as well as newspapers, shows how important paper usage has become. Emerging economies like Cameroon, rely on imported and locally produced paper and paper products with no available paper recycling opportunities leading to significant discernible environmental impacts such as pollution, increased deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions. This study used a life cycle analysis (LCA) to ascertain paper consumption and its ensuing environmental impacts in Buea District of south west Cameroon. It observed that, over 1087919kg of paper are consumed annually. The study concluded that, the digitalization of government and para-public services is necessary to curb this upsurge of paper use as well as reduce the resulting environmental impact.
    VL  - 1
    IS  - 1
    ER  - 

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Author Information
  • Department of Forest Management, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing, China

  • Department of Forest Management, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing, China

  • Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

  • Community Service for Environmental Protection (COSEP), South West Region, Cameroon

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