“In fact, it is surprising to learn, the great majority of pre-war British books were manufactured from esparto grass, from French North Africa, and the instant absence of superior esparto (272,000 tons were imported in 1939) meant that paper-makers had to use instead lower-quality domestic oat, wheat and barley straw, as well as salvage from rags and waste paper. The pulping of old books was stopped when it was found that irreplaceable volumes were being mulched for munition-wadding and cartridge-boxes. There were problems with staff as well: publishing was not a reserved occupation, so key personnel were called up. And books were vulnerable to the Blitz. On the night of December 29, 1940, German bombs destroyed the premises of seventeen publishing firms in Paternoster Row, as well as the offices of the Bookseller and the warehouse of the country’s largest book wholesaler. (Liberated from its non-selling stock, Longman was the first company to turn disaster to profit.)”

“The June “wheat sheet” printing of Canadian Geographic had to rely on agricultural pulp imported from China. In Canada, there is no source of agricultural pulp aside from the ARC’s test facility, while China meets 20% of its pulp needs with agricultural sources already—a legacy from the use, historically, of rice and grain fibres for paper-making.”