News

Guildford Printer Gains FSC Accreditation

Crown Litho, Guildford, already award winners for sustained environmental improvement (award winners in 2003 & 2004 Surrey Sustainable Business Awards) have become the 6th UK printer to gain FSC status.

This means that an environmentally conscious buyer wanting to use FSC paper can specify this through Crown Litho and retain FSC status. If a printer does not have the accreditation, the job may be printed on a recognised FSC grade, but the chain of custody that FSC recognises is broken.

It is the chain of custody aspect that is crucial to FSC. The paper can be traced through its manufacture to the forest it was grown in and conditions of production are monitored along the way. This audit trail is continued through the printing process where the printer has FSC accreditation.

For the Surrey printer this has meant breaking its operational procedures into separate production steps, maintaining records that specify the actions taken and controls to be applied at each stage. Needless to say all materials and processes used need to be environmentally friendly.

Ian Spicer, environmental manager, said that in recent months enquiries about FSC have been increasing. "There is a demand for it," he added. "We are definitely getting more jobs going down the FSC route and there are more papers available. FSC is definitely more widely known."

Crown Litho have long been an advocate of using recycled paper, building huge expertise in this area and so helping customers to specify the right grade for the job. This now extends to FSC grades as more become available.

Crown Litho has also gained ISO 14001, which has proved a stepping stone for the more rigorous FSC scheme.

Mr. Spicer said "We can now ensure that only FSC paper has been used, where specified, throughout the print run. Attaining the standard was a demanding process that required us to look at environmental impacts across the whole of the business."

Crown Litho's audit was carried out by BM Trada Certification which is experienced in FSC work, monitoring how forests are managed for a range of forest derived products.

Environmental organisations which we currently print for are WWF, Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth.

Crown goes paperless!

One of our Targets & Achievements involved the reduction of the use of paper in the office and increase the use of electronic communication at the expense of paper communications. Not only do we use scrap paper and monitor the ordering of office paper we have a paperless fax system.