(10 September 2019) - Most of the paper packaging material made by Canadian mills today is 100% recycled content. Old corrugated boxes and cartons are collected from the back of factories and supermarkets; used paper from offices; and a wide range of paper material gathered and sorted from residential (Blue Box) programs across the country.

These are the words in the Ocean Plastics Charter that Canada signed along with other G7 countries except Japan and the US. But what do they actually mean?

Yes, plastic litter (any litter for that matter) and marine pollution is terrible, and we need to have a long hard look at our consumption habits and to reduce our use of fossil fuels.

Three provinces lag significantly behind the others in solid waste management in Canada: Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta. And what’s worse, their low diversion rates (ranging from between 16 and 18%) have not changed much over the last eight years, according to the latest data from Statistics Canada.

Three provinces sit in the middle of Canada’s waste disposal charts. But because two of them (Quebec and Ontario) together contain 60% of Canada’s population, they basically determine the country’s overall waste management performance.

Nova Scotia might have the country’s highest diversion rate as a province (44%) but British Columbians recycle more as individuals.

Some environmental campaigns (not all) typically demonise their target using exaggeration, hyperbole, and just plain false information.

A diversion rate of 27% might not sound too impressive but it’s better than the 24% of a few years back.

Municipal politicians love to point to “industry” as the main contributor to Canada’s waste stream. And while it’s true that most garbage today does come from industrial sources, there are clear signs that more and more garbage is being dumped by householders.

We start off big. Canada, after all, is the second-largest country in the world. But to define the extent of its forest lands, we first need to remove all the water: the lakes, the rivers, and the streams that together make up almost nine per cent of the country.

We are not aware of any scientific environmental evidence that one is 'better' than the other. In fact, they are really the same material, just coming from different places along the feedstock supply chain.

While the collective weight of Blue Box materials generated by Ontario households has not changed much over the last 15 years, the type of material that ends up there certainly has.

Well not all of them yet. But I am honoured to summarise some very positive reviews of my recently published book: Deforestation in Canada and Other Fake News.

The recovery rate of Ontario's residential Blue Box system has slipped again, to its lowest level since 2005. According to Stewardship Ontario, the 2017 recovery rate was 61.3 per cent, down almost two per cent on the previous year. The provincial target is 60 per cent.

Canadians are dumping slightly more waste than they did back in 2002, but because there are more of us around today, what we dump per person has fallen almost eight per cent since then. So there is good news and bad news in our analysis of StatsCan's latest waste disposal numbers.

Put a retailer, a brandowner, a sustainability expert, and an environmental advocate in the same room together and what do you get? PPEC's workshop on November 7, that's what.

When people learn that I work for the paper industry it's usually not too long before the conversation somehow drifts towards 'killing' or 'saving' trees and deforestation.

It was a one-paragraph obituary near the bottom of the page. H.T. "Telford" Denard had passed away. Cremation had already taken place, and no formal services would be held "as per his wishes."

Yes, we know that packaging is evil and that it should be legislated out of existence. But sometimes those ignorant throw-away lines about packaging waste really do rankle and must be corrected. Case in point: a recent article by Eric Reguly in the Globe and Mail newspaper.

The Canadian retail industry is undergoing massive change, shedding bricks and mortar for the new exciting world of e-commerce. In the driver's seat are consumers. Click and point with the mouse. It's so easy. In today's world, convenience is king.

I love fish. Plastic not so much. This puts me in good company, it seems, with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who recently told the World Economic Forum that the "plastics issue" will be the main theme at the G7 leaders' summit in Charlevoix, Quebec in June.