The Impact of Deforestation on the Environment and Sustainable Development
The Department of General Services (DGS), Procurement Division, Environmentally Preferable Purchasing (EPP) program understands that eco-labels for paper and paper bags go hand in hand in promoting sustainable choices of paper procurement and reducing the impact of deforestation. The EPP program promotes selecting products with lower environmental impacts and has created a DGS Recommended Eco-labels List. This list presents an overview of certifications for various commodities, specifically focusing on environmental certifications. The document offers valuable guidance on seamlessly integrating these certifications into the procurement process, assisting departments in making informed decisions and prioritizing sustainable choices.
Understanding Eco Labels
Eco-labels are certification systems that indicate a product's environmental performance and adherence to environmental standards. Based on assessments, these labels evaluate a product's entire lifecycle – from sourcing raw materials to manufacturing, distribution, and disposal. When it comes to deforestation, eco-labels play a crucial role in guiding departments toward making informed choices that minimize their contribution to this environmental threat.
Eco Labels and Deforestation Mitigation
- Promoting Sustainable Forest Management: Eco-labels encourage companies to adopt sustainable forest management practices. Responsible logging methods, preserving biodiversity, and replenishing harvested trees maintain an ecological balance.
- Ensuring Traceability and Transparency: With eco-labels, companies must provide detailed information about the sources of their raw materials. This transparency helps prevent the use of illegally harvested timber and supports sustainable supply chains.
- Supporting Certified Products: Certifications like the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) label guarantee that the product comes from responsibly managed forests. By supporting such certified products, departments contribute to preserving natural habitats and responsible forest management. By choosing products with the FSC label, departments can actively support the protection of forests, biodiversity, and the well-being of communities dependent on them.
- Labeling Categories: The FSC label has three main categories with specific requirements. For example, products that carry the FSC 100% label are made entirely from FSC-certified materials. FSC recycled labeled products that contain a minimum percentage of recycled materials, promoting State Agency Buy Recycled Campaign (SABRC) compliance. FSC mix are products that are a mix of FSC-certified and controlled materials, indicating a commitment to responsible sourcing. Departments can use the evaluative criterion mentioned above for assessing green products during the procurement processes and recognizing the efforts of businesses.
- Raising Consumer Awareness: Eco-labels are educational tools that help departments recognize and choose products that align with their green values. Market incentives for companies to take steps towards sustainability and decrease their impact on deforestation increase demand for eco-label products.
- Greenwashing: Some companies may misuse eco-labels for marketing without genuinely adopting sustainable practices. To combat greenwashing, stricter monitoring, and standardized labeling criteria are essential. That is why it's vital to consider eco-labels a standard when choosing products and services.
- Certification Costs: Obtaining eco-labels can be costly for smaller producers, potentially limiting their ability to participate in sustainable practices. Initiatives to support smaller businesses and promote affordable certifications are crucial for inclusivity.
We invite you to explore our Buying Green Guide for comprehensive information on paper products with green contract specifications that are better for the environment. To access this resource, kindly navigate to the left-hand side of the guide and select "Paper Products" under the section titled "Find EPP Goods and Services." By visiting our guide, you can gain insights into sustainable practices that align with responsible procurement and contribute to a greener approach to paper purchases and usage.
Impacts of Deforestation
Deforestation is a significant issue that harms the environment and sustainable development. It involves the removal of forest cover and the cutting down of trees, often driven by various factors such as agriculture expansion, urban development, logging of timber or paper production, and extraction of natural resources like oil and minerals.
Notably, regions like the Amazon rainforest and Indonesia witness large-scale deforestation for purposes like cattle ranching, soybean farming, and palm oil plantations. This destructive practice results in soil erosion, loss of biodiversity, altered local climate patterns, and the release of carbon dioxide, a significant contributor to global warming. 
We must reach the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) set by the United Nations to fight deforestation. SDG 15 encourages "Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss."
Furthermore, SDG 13 suggests, “Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts” because of the link to deforestation, with forests as crucial carbon sinks. By adopting sustainable forest management practices, protecting precious trees, and reducing greenhouse gas emissions, we can reduce climate change's effects and preserve healthy forests. Governments, businesses, and individuals from around the world need to work together to achieve these goals to bring about generations of prosperity and sustainability.
Deforestation remains a critical environmental issue requiring a collective top-down and bottom-up approach within state departments and their value chain. Eco-labels present a practical means to inform and measure state departments' sustainable choices, thereby driving demand for responsible practices. To effectively combat deforestation, ongoing efforts to enhance transparency, enforce rigorous certification standards, and promote responsible forest management are imperative. Incorporating eco-labels as an evaluative criterion for assessing green products during the procurement processes and recognizing the efforts of businesses that invest resources and effort in certifying their products can significantly contribute to waste diversion from landfills, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, conserve energy and water consumption, ad effectively decrease paper waste.
Environmentally Preferable Purchasing (EPP) Training
The California Procurement and Contracting Academy (CalPCA) has developed training modules to help requisitioners, buyers, supervisors, and managers easily buy green. These training programs assist procurement officials by introducing usable criteria while purchasing goods and services to increase EPP within a department.
To participate in online self-paced training, register free here.
The BASIC and Executive training will cover:
The BASIC course will focus on usable criteria while purchasing goods and services to increase EPP within your department. This program will cover third-party environmental certifications, DGS purchasing standards, SABRC-compliant products, product take-back programs, greenwashing, and EPP resources. The training will equip you with the knowledge and skills to identify approved certifications and labels, use standards within your procurement contracts, report goods and materials within the SABRC category, identify EPP goods, and provide guidance on available resources.
The EXECUTIVE course will focus on the DGS EPP practices that align with state contracting policies that support climate initiatives. This certificate will cover the benefits of the state EPP program, reasons for establishing an EPP program in your organization, recommended steps and strategies for implementing an EPP program, and access to additional resources that provide specific fundamentals to the process.
Who should participate?
- Purchasers
- Purchasing Authority Contacts (PACs)
- Procurement and Contracting Officers (PCOs)
- Small Business/Disabled Veteran Business Enterprise (SB/DVBE) advocates
- Supervisors and Managers
- Executives
Furthermore, the EPP and the Financial Information System for California (FI$Cal) job aids provide mutually inclusive “how-to” instruction on buying green. Click on the job aids links below to learn more about applying EPP to your purchases.