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International Paper

Last edited by on June 17, 2009 - 11:05pm
Company Snapshot: 

International Paper is an American pulp and paper company, the second largest pulp and paper company in the world. The company produces printing and writing papers, pulp, paperboard and packaging and wood products. It also manufactures specialty items including tissue products; photographic films, papers and equipment; nonwovens; specialty chemicals; and specialty panels and laminated products. The Company also distributes printing and writing papers and other products in the United States, Europe and the Pacific Rim.

It has approximately 60,000 employees. Its global headquarters are currently in Memphis, Tennessee. It owns a half million acres of land in the U.S. and owns or has harvesting rights to almost a million acres in Brazil and Russia.

Number of employees worldwide: 
60,600
Chief executive officer: 
John V. Faraci
Website: 
http://www.internationalpaper.com/
2008 Global Fortune 500 rank: 
382
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Corporate accountability
Environment and product safety: 

IP reports it has significant liability at 46 Superfund (CERCLA) web sites. It is listed as a responsible party at a total of 87 Superfund sites.

Researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst identified International Paper as the 27th-largest corporate producer of air pollution in the United States, releasing more than 35 million pounds of toxic compounds into the air annually. Major pollutants included sulfuric acid, manganese compounds, chromium, and chlorine dioxide. International Paper has also been named a potentially responsible party in at least 31 Superfund sites. In 2001 the corporation was one of more than 40 parties found responsible for the estimated $US 20 million cleanup of the Tri-Cities Barrel toxic waste site near Binghamton, NY.

Company facility-specific pollution date from the Right-to-Know Network for the latest year (2003) (data is all self-reported by the company to US EPA, as part of the Toxic Release Inventory program):

EASTOVER SC: Waste Generated (lbs): 11,677,191 Lbs Released (to the environment on-site): 2,181,605

AUGUSTA GA 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 20,449,454 Lbs Released: 2,666,801

JAY ME 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 10,722,817 Lbs Released: 940,855

TICONDEROGA NY 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 4,601,858 Lbs Released: 600,837

LANCASTER OH 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 189,791 Lbs Released: 3,799 Lbs Transferred: 20,481

PRATTVILLE AL 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 13,798,258 Lbs Released: 2,600,211

ROANOKE RAPIDS NC 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 9,154,664 Lbs Released: 1,050,333 Lbs Transferred: 62

MANSFIELD LA 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 8,492,133 Lbs Released: 7,674,225

HAMILTON OH 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 51,149 Lbs Released: 353 Lbs Transferred: 26,298

PENSACOLA CANTONMENT FL 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 16,166,116 Lbs Released: 2,450,960 Lbs Transferred: 135,543

RIVERDALE SELMA AL 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 3,207,531 Lbs Released: 751,000 Lbs Transferred: 1,221

BUCKSPORT ME 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 436,604 Lbs Released: 410,053

TERRE HAUTE IN 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 326,366 Lbs Released: 125,736 Lbs Transferred: 1,300

QUINNESEC MI 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 11,029,913 Lbs Released: 416,074

PINE BLUFF AR 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 16,643,841 Lbs Released: 4,245,470

BASTROP LA 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 16,747,804 Lbs Released: 2,738,561

PLANT CITY FL 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 5,462 Lbs Released: 4,768 Lbs Transferred: 694

SAVANNAH GA 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 12,221,449 Lbs Released: 2,112,649 Lbs Transferred: 425,580

SARTELL MN 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 316,345 Lbs Released: 54,035 Lbs Transferred: 211

COURTLAND AL 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 11,834,233 Lbs Released: 2,436,492 Lbs Transferred: 0

DE PERE WI 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 67,772 Lbs Released: 67,641 Lbs Transferred: 131

GEORGETOWN SC 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 19,767,827 Lbs Released: 2,354,039 Lbs Transferred: 70,027

KAUKAUNA WI 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 3,074,540 Lbs Released: 1,175,120

NATCHEZ MS 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 3,946,515 Lbs Released: 882,295 Lbs Transferred: 10,320

PINEVILLE LA 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 5,751,721 Lbs Released: 1,118,931

RIEGELWOOD NC 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 16,303,592 Lbs Released: 4,492,101

QUEEN CITY (TEXARKANA) TX 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 21,866,185 Lbs Released: 4,715,246

REDWOOD (VICKSBURG) MS 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 6,264,937 Lbs Released: 1,550,516

FRANKLIN VA 2003 Waste Generated (lbs): 44,614,333 Lbs Released: 3,610,402 Lbs Transferred: 576,388

IP Lies Exposed

In 1995, the U.S. Second Court of Appeals in New York ruled on February 12 that IP violated federal securities law by making "misleading statements [that] omitted material facts" in the firm's 1992 proxy statement to shareholders. The ruling resulted from a suit filed by the United Paperworkers International Union (UPIU), affirming federal district court judge Charles Brieant's August 1992 ruling that IP management had lied to stockholders in order to defeat a resolution calling on the company to comply with the Valdez Principles, a set of environmental standards intended to be independently and externally monitored.

In its complaint, the UPIU cited a history of environmental infractions committed by IP, including five felony convictions in July 1991 for lying to federal and state regulators and for unlawful hazardous waste disposal at IP's Androscoggin Mill in Jay, Maine.

Brieant wrote in his decision, "The total impression conveyed by the board's glib response to the proposal is that the company is a model of environmental rectitude. Nowhere in any of these materials is there even bare acknowledgment that the company has had its share of difficulties in this area." The judge concluded that IP management's response to the Valdez proposal was a "calculated attempt to mislead the shareholders and induce them to cast a negative vote on a resolution ( filed by Presbyterian shareholders); rather than portraying [the company's environmental] record accurately, or remaining silent, it chose to engage in flowery corporate happy- talk in order to defeat the proposal." (Source: Multinational Monitor, May 1995)

Members of the opposition parties, as well as environmental groups accused the company of lobbying the Mexican government to weaken forestry laws in Mexico. Opposition members of Congress released a letter sent by IP to the office of then-president Zedillo, recommending that Mexico implement legal reforms to encourage the planting of species of trees appropriate for logging. The company also urged the implementation of tax incentives and the creation of a state entity that would promote the planting of trees and expressed an interest in investing in Mexico, adding that it had identified land in the states of Chiapas, Oaxaca, Tabasco and Veracruz suitable for the development of forestry projects.

In early 1997, IP paid $72,000 to settle civil charges that it destroyed northern spotted owl habitat in the Pacific Northwest, in what the US Fish and Wildlife Service called the "largest financial settlement of alleged violations of spotted owl protections under the (federal) Endangered Species Act." Under the agreement, the paper company admitted no guilt or liability, but paid $47,000 to the Nature Conservancy and $25,000 to a government project that locates and monitors spotted owl populations. (Greenwire January 8, 1997)

Political influence (national and international): 

The company spent $2,620,000 for lobbying in 2006. $200,000 went to lobbying firm Capitol Tax Partners with the remainder being spent using in-house lobbyists.

The International Paper political action committee gave $313,999 to federal candidates in the 2006 election cycle - 14% to Democrats, 86% to Republicans.

History

International Paper was formed in January 1898 by the merger of 17 pulp and paper mills in the northeastern U.S. Through acquisitions and capital investment, the company grew both in the United States and internationally. In 1986 it acquired the HammerMill Paper Company, in 1988 the Masonite Corporation, and in 1989 the German paper company Zanders Feinpapiere AG and the French paper manufacturer Aussedat Rey. In addition International Paper has shareholdings in the Chilean company Copec. In 1999, International Paper purchased Union Camp Corporation and in 2000 purchased Champion International. Most recently International Paper sold the Wood Products division of the company to West Fraser Timber Inc., out of Vancouver, B.C. This included 13 saw mills, making West Fraser the second largest producer of lumber in North America, next to Weyerhaeuser Company.

Specialized Information
Major units/subsidiaries/affiliates: 

According to the company's annual report, as of the end of 2006, the company operated 18 pulp, paper and packaging mills, 94 converting and packaging plants, 24 wood products facilities and six specialty chemicals plants.

Production facilities in Europe, Asia, Latin America and South America include six pulp, paper and packaging mills, 51 converting and packaging plants, and five specialty chemicals plants.

As of 2006, the company also owned or managed 500,000 acres of forestlands in the U.S., approximately 370,000 acres in Brazil, and had, through licenses and forest management agreements, harvesting rights on approximately 500,000 acres of government-owned forestlands in Russia.