Next Generation Solutions
The Age of Solutions
There’s no need for trees hundreds of years old to be logged to make pizza boxes or t-shirts when alternatives already exist. Game-changing Next Generation (Next Gen) technologies are just waiting to be scaled up. Next Gen Solutions use innovative sources of fibre to make paper packaging and viscose textiles, so we don’t have to destroy the world’s precious forests. It’s time to build supply chains for the 21st Century!
Next Gen Solutions are the designs, systems, and technologies that will enable us to protect 30-50% of the world’s forests by 2030.
We help companies eliminate the use of controversial forest fibre and access sustainable alternatives instead. Millions of tonnes of Next Gen papers for packaging, made from agricultural fibres, rather than trees, are already available. Millions more can be made to replace paper made from Ancient and Endangered Forests. Mountains of textile waste can be reprocessed to manufacture next season’s fabrics with a much smaller environmental footprint. Through redesign, reuse, and rethinking ‘waste,’ Next Gen technologies enable us to forge a path to planetary survival.
Together with tech innovators, brands, and forward-thinking producers, we are drawing Next Gen products out of small scale niches and onto the common market so that these transformative solutions can ease the pressure on the world’s forests, species, and climate.
SURVIVAL: Canopy’s Next Generation Plan to Conserve 30-50% of Earth’s Forests
It is time to transform last century’s unsustainable supply chains for paper and Man-Made Cellulosic Fibres to be smarter in design and circular in nature. SURVIVAL – A Pulp Thriller is the action plan for building and retrofitting production systems that are suited to the ecological realities of our times.
Science experts have set ambitious targets for conserving and protecting the world’s high carbon and species-rich forests. In this turnaround decade these targets are key to reaching climate goals. A fundamental part of our work is to accelerate the scale-up of game-changing technologies that produce alternatives to fibres sourced from Ancient and Endangered Forests. We call these Next Generation Solutions.
Next Generation technologies commonly use 90% less water, up to 75% less energy, and contribute to keeping vital forest ecosystems standing.
Be Part of the Solution
SURVIVAL maps out how to remove the Ancient and Endangered fibre currently in the paper and textile supply chains over the course of the next decade. Next Gen Solutions are essential to achieving global climate and biodiversity targets. Join us to be part of the solution!
Next Generation Solutions: Paper Packaging
The world’s Ancient and Endangered Forests are being cut down at an alarming rate to make paper products such as takeout containers, shoeboxes, shipping boxes, and other packaging. Much of this finds its way, at best, to a recycling bin or, at worst, into a landfill.
Next Gen packaging made from agricultural waste left after the food harvest, or utilizing recycled fibres, carries a substantially lighter environmental footprint than conventional tree-based packaging. We can create paper packaging and keep the world’s most important forests standing. Reducing waste, creating green jobs, and protecting forests and the planet — now, these are solutions to be excited about.
Our Partners
Canopy’s call to action points to the essential role of the world’s forests in mitigating the climate crisis and the growing sense of urgency to prevent further loss of biodiversity. In alignment with Canopy’s ambitions, we are continuing the challenging work to diversify the fiber used in Kimberly-Clark’s products, including progress toward our goal to replace 50% of the fiber we use from natural forests with alternative sources.
Lisa Morden, Vice President of Safety & Sustainability, Kimberly Clark
Next Generation Solutions: Fabrics and Fashion
Creativity and innovation are woven into the fabric of the fashion industry. We see it every year on the catwalks of Paris, Milan, and Hong Kong. We are bringing that same spirit of innovation to the fabrics in fashion as well.
Right now, a growing number of producers are making viscose/MMCF from the cellulose in recycled textiles such as old cotton jeans or t-shirts otherwise destined for landfills. There are exciting new technologies that draw on other alternative feedstocks, such as agricultural waste left after the food harvest or cellulose grown by fermentation to make pristine fabrics.
Circular economy fabrics are already hitting the clothing racks. Innovations and alternatives that take the forests out of fabrics like viscose are ready to be scaled up.
Now, those are some on-trend solutions!
Our Partners
Setting clear procurement targets and investing in more sustainable solutions such as Next Generation fibres is key to our overall goal – to save resources and to turn waste into something beautiful.
Pascal Brun, Head of Sustainability, H&M
Keep Ancient and Endangered Forests Standing
By supporting Canopy’s work, you help to protect the world’s most integral forests and change the systems that drive their degradation and loss.
Together, we can protect the natural world, the climate, and humanity.
