B.C. loses newspaper recycling facilities

Newspapers collected through the blue box program in B.C. will soon be shipped to the United States or even as far as Asia for recycling, following the shutdown of two Catalyst Paper Corp. facilities.

Demand for the company's recycled paper fell 30 per cent last year, and there is a similar forecast this year, Catalyst vice-president Lyn Brown told CBC News.

"The market is in steep decline for the products made at our Crofton paper mill, and that has been a factor in the past year," Brown said.

"As we look ahead we don't see the consumption of those commodity grades rebounding particularly quickly. The requirement for the product made at Coquitlam has been affected by across-the-board paper shipment decline."

As a result, the company decided to shut down its operations at Crofton on Vancouver Island and Coquitlam, east of Vancouver, indefinitely. About 70 jobs will be lost.

The company cut 127 jobs at its Powell River operation in February 2009, citing the declining price of paper as the cause.