Resources
Our reports, documents and tools share what we have learnt about better book supply chains.
Forest Country Risk
The tool belongs to Carnstone but is freely available to download and use. Please do credit Carnstone Partners Ltd if you reproduce the results or methodology of the tool.
Find out more about how we use the tool to assess forest risk.
USA Seminar 2022
After two years of lockdowns, isolation and online meetings, we are so excited to finally meet in person with our US-based publishers, mills, suppliers, and other stakeholders.
This year's theme is "Two Sides to the Story". We often think of the industry's impacts on sustainability challenges, but are increasingly also facing the impacts of climate change, biodiversity loss and other issues as an industry.
The Seminar will be an informal afternoon with guest speaker presentations and opportunities for networking and catching up. We will be sharing more details on the agenda in the following weeks.
Attendance is by invitation for the stakeholders involved with the Book Chain Project. Please get in touch if you'd like to attend.
Biodiversity Risk Tool
This tool assesses the biodiversity risk of the location of the sources that made up paper brands, based on Conservation International Biodiversity Hotspots, Alliance for Zero Extinction sites and NatureMap Forest Biodiversity Intactness Index.
The tool belongs to Carnstone but is freely available to download and use. Please do credit Carnstone Partners Ltd if you reproduce the results or methodology of the tool.
Species Risk Tool
This tool assesses species risk for tree species commonly used in paper-making, based on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species and Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) Appendices.
The tool belongs to Carnstone but is freely available to download and use. Please do credit Carnstone Partners Ltd if you reproduce the results or methodology of the tool.
Open letter: support in measuring and reducing the environmental footprint of the global publishing industry
Open letter signed by Production Directors of 18 Publishers participating in the Book Chain Project, requesting paper and print suppliers to support the measurement and reduction of the environmental footprint of the global publishing industry by providing information through the Book Chain Project's Environmental Questionnaire.
Design Guide for the publishing industry
In keeping with the aims of the Book Chain Project, we have created the Design Guide to help all actors involved in the design decision making process to make informed decisions about the materials and / or processes they are using. The Design Guide covers a number of different materials and processes and scores them based on their environmental and health & safety or labour impact, as well as their recyclability.
Certification Robustness
This document critically evaluates the robustness of the two main forest certification systems – FSC and PEFC – in ten countries. We started by building up an overview of country-specific forest risks for each country based on reputable sources such as Chatham House, Preferred by Nature and Earthsight. We then assessed the applicable FSC and PEFC standards against the country risk profile, highlighting key gaps.
The countries included are: Brazil, Czech Republic, Hungary, Indonesia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Slovakia, and Ukraine.
We recommend that this document is used to understand the level of certification robustness in priority countries, as a basis for setting sourcing policies based on a company's risk appetite.
Supplier Code Of Conduct
The Book Chain Project provides a publishing industry Code of Conduct for labour and environmental standards. It states the publishers’ commitments to their suppliers and what they expect from their suppliers in return. The Code of Conduct is based on existing internationally-recognized Codes and Laws. Suppliers that do not already have an ethical audit can ask for a SMETA audit that is audited against this Code of Conduct.
Impact Report 2006-2020
This report summarises the impact achieved by the Book Chain Project over the past 15 years. It traces the history of the Book Chain Project, from 3 separate tools to one collaborative project building better book supply chains; looks at our reach; summarises our work and impact across the 3 workstreams; describes our collaborations; and ends with a look at the future.
CDP Forests - How to achieve leadership
The high-profile clearance of the Amazon rainforest late last year and the Australian bushfires this year made headlines around the world, putting deforestation at the top of the agenda. Together with NGOs, investors are pushing for greater transparency and action on this issue from businesses through investor-led initiatives such as CDP. This document looks into the annual CDP reporting process and what is required of a company to be considered a leader in the CDP Forests questionnaire.
Restarting operations after Covid-19 lockdown
This document is sharing good practice from Chinese print suppliers on their experiences when restarting their operations after the Covid-19 lockdown. We know that each country will face unique challenges, but we thought it might be useful to share these insights as other factories across the world start to think about reopening or scaling up production. We've also included reference to some of the useful guidance that is emerging from organisations like the ILO.
Australian bushfires 2019-20: what does this mean for the pulp & paper industry?
Over the course of September 2019 to March 2020, Australia experienced bushfires that burned an unprecedented 12 million hectares of land, killed 33 people and one billion animals. The fires were the biggest in Australia’s history and will have unparalleled impacts that we are only just beginning to understand. The Australian Forest Products Association, an industry body, is urging the Australian government to salvage log in order to mitigate the severe impacts of the fire, however there is significant evidence showing the catastrophic impacts salvage logging can have. The decision on how to proceed is ongoing. Despite the size and disastrous nature of the bushfires, it is unlikely that they will have significant ramifications on the global pulp and paper industry as Australia exports only account for 3%.
- Australia
Book Chain Project Terms of Use
This document outlines the Terms of Use for the stakeholders engaged in the BCP system; the participating Publishers, the Suppliers (printers and other suppliers) and the paper and integrated pulp & paper Mills. It also outlines access rights and the data management within the system by Carnstone.
Creating Safer Workplaces: A special project report
This is the end of year report for the special project improving Health and Safety in print factories in China. The report summaries this year's activities, impact achieved and lessons learnt for the year ahead
- China
Plastics Guide for the Publishing Industry
In keeping with the aims of the Book Chain Project, we’ve produced this guide to help our publishers make informed decisions around the design, purchasing and production of their books, magazines and journals. It shares an overview of the situation today, looks at some of the common misconceptions, charts the new developments in this area, and presents good practice from other sectors.
Mill Assessment Scoring Framework
Download the scoring tool we use to assess mill performance on responsible sourcing, environmental management, and human resources management. This information is fed back to the mills, alongside useful resources to drive improvement.
Mill Assessment Guide
In 2018, The Book Chain Project began the first step towards deeper engagement with paper mills. We wanted to better understand how our mills manage responsible paper sourcing, to increase our efforts to halt illegal logging. To do this we developed our mill assessment process which allows us to set out our long-term expectations and start a dialogue. By identifying mills with the desire and intent to improve, the output from this initiative will help us better support their development. Download the document to find out more about why we started this initiative and the criteria we use to understand mill performance