White paper

Flat White

No, you’re not imagining it… Trying to find white A4 printer paper in Australia is getting more difficult and expensive as the fallout continues from the closure of Opal. On this occasion, the whole of Australia can turn around and glare at the Victorian government. Labor’s ruthless ‘green’ transition policies regarding logging are solely to blame after the supply of wood pulp ended abruptly.

The days of walking into Office Works and seeing blue boxes of Reflex piled high at the door are gone. Australia is no longer manufacturing white paper, we are importing it. Formally, Opal produced 200,000 tonnes every year.

Australia’s last paper manufacturer stopped producing Reflex out of its Maryvale mill in the Latrobe Valley earlier this year. When the final roll of paper was printed, workers signed it as one might scribble over a signature bear on the last day of school.

‘It was very surreal – for us guys that have been there for anywhere between 10 to 20 years, it was a bit strange to see that last ream,’ said one of the workers, according to the ABC.

‘We took a photo and we were smiling in the photo … but that wasn’t the way we were feeling at the time. It was a very sad moment.’

With Reflex accounting for half of Australia’s paper needs, the closure of the mill has created a disaster for supply which we are only now beginning to feel as stockpiles run dry.

Opal was also the largest employer in the Latrobe Valley. Darren Chester, the Federal Member for Gippsland, has been vocal in his criticism of the Labor government, placing the responsibility on Premier Daniel Andrews, saying that he must accept ‘100 per cent’ of the blame for the job losses.

It comes off the back of Labor’s primary focus to end the native timber industry – something that keeps the Greens at bay despite ongoing controversy regarding the health of the forests once they are locked up and – as some argue – left to burn.

Said Chester:

‘Victorian Premier Dan Andrews’ plan to shut down the native timber industry is a plan to kill country towns, to kill wildlife, and to kill Australian jobs. People and wildlife die in poorly managed forests. The combined impact of judicial activism, environmental protests, green law-fare, and the abject failure of the Victorian Labor government to support our world-class and environmentally sustainable timber industry is devastating regional communities across Gippsland.’

Even CFMEU Manufacturing noted that the sudden and complete loss of Australia’s white paper industry was ‘disastrous, not inevitable’ and also the ‘tragic result of the state government’s mismanagement of the native forest sector and a bumbling approach by Opal’.

Opal has blamed the shutdown of its M5 production on court rulings made against the state-owned VicForests, which supplies materials to the mill. When the Supreme Court put extensive restrictions of VicForests’ logging, VicForests was unable to meet its supply agreement with Opal. The full extent of the ruling and Victoria’s Forestry Plan has left many businesses and contractors in a financial lurch. The Labor government was not kidding when it said, ‘transition won’t be for all’.

This is where Net Zero rhetoric hits the road, with Opal noting that the closure was ‘a response to this sudden and unexpected suspension of supply’.

It’s not only the Andrews’ government circling the wagons on the Victorian paper industry. The Guardian also reports that there was an industry boycott against Reflex in favour of changing environmental practices in Victoria.

It’s a story we are starting to see over and over, where social politics is being used to stage a boycott of a dominant market product. Net Zero, and other green-inspired systems (such as carbon footprint calculations) mean that instead of competing with the quality of the product, we are now stuck in this game of ‘ideological purity’ where the dominant market force is a company’s environmental credentials. This is fine, if this is what Australians want, but consumers need to be prepared to pay more or accept supply chain issues.

While activists might be happy about the demise of Reflex, businesses are facing critical shortages and rising costs right in the middle of a financial crisis. Net Zero consequences are crushing in on them from every direction, even from the most mundane and previously reliable products.

School children and their parents are also one of the main groups hurt by the sudden loss of domestic paper supplies.

As the Gippsland Times writes:

‘Shortages of the following products are expected in the coming weeks: medical prescription pads and print papers; A3, A4 and A5 print and copy paper; printed bills from service providers to customers, such as Energy Australia and Telstra; custom printing papers such as posters and specialist print jobs; exercise books; receipt books, envelopes; food bags – flour, sugar, lollies; hot food – barbecue chicken; hot dogs; kebabs and Jiffy postage bags.’

Governments need to learn that if you’re going to manipulate situations politically to destabilise a product (as we saw in NSW where plastic packaging was brought to its knees almost overnight), then ministers and their respective departments have to plan properly so as not to disrupt millions of Australians.

In this case, there has not been sufficient thought put into the replacement supply of paper products.

As reported by the Guardian:

The Victorian government promised a $120m investment into the plantation timber industry to shore up supply, but Chris McEvoy, the managing director of the sawmill and plantation company Radial Timber, says that funding hasn’t materialised. Nor has a reformed carbon trading scheme, which would allow plantation timber growers to generate credits.

“When carrots are dangled and nothing’s done, people are waiting for the government to end uncertainty before putting trees in the ground,” McEvoy says.

Different groups have begged the government to change import tariffs to keep paper costs down. And yes, in case you were wondering, importing the entire supply of paper into Australia doesn’t only leave the nation extremely vulnerable to supply chains on the edge of Pacific conflict, it creates a larger carbon footprint.

CEO of Office Brands Adam Joy said in December of 2022:

“This will have a serious and immediate impact on paper supplies across the country.”

As a result, Office Brands, together with the Australian Lottery and Newsagents Association, Group Newsagent Supplies and Office Choice has written to the Minister for Industry, Ed Husic, seeking his urgent intervention to temporarily suspend anti-dumping duties on paper imported to Australia to open up supply.

“Our members have proven their resilience over the past couple of years as they have evolved to address supply issues in challenging times to meet the needs of their customers. This current situation is a kick in the guts and comes at the worst possible time,” he said.

While the CEO of the Australian Lottery and Newsagents Association, Ben Kearney, added:

‘We are very disappointed, it’s a terrible outcome. We’ve already seen white copy paper has risen by as much as 50 per cent and there are concerns about securing supply in the medium term.’

They, among others, are working with the Anti-Dumping Commission to get rid of tariffs on A4 copy paper.

In the meantime, Australians can add paper to the list of things they can no longer afford, yet used to enjoy. With this level of political incompetence and arrogance, things are going to get worse.

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