Defense the Green Position of Graphic Communications Industry and Find Ways to Make it Greener

Abstract

Graphic communications industry, or printing industry, has a tradition of more than one thousand years. Putting ink on paper, or on some other substrates, is the basic form of printing, although the industry has been modernizing by the up-to-date science and technology such as internet communication and digital printing, etc., since the info-tech revolution of recent decades. Printing jobs are still in much need today and printing presses everywhere are keeping busy with a steady influx of orders everyday. As a professor working in the graphic communications field, facing some perception and confusions among everyone from government and corporations to environmental groups and mums and dads that paper and print is 'bad' for the environment and that printed communications aren't effective, we have responsibilities to study the present situation of this industry in the environment-oriented world and try as much as possible to find ways to make our industry become greener. Firstly, we need to answer if the printing communication is not a green medium comparing to other methods of communication. If the answer is positive, we need to defense the green position of the graphic communications industry. Secondly, to troubleshoot the pollution problems of the printing production processes, so that, thirdly, to find ways to make the industry become an environment-friendly one.