Britain's largest export, by volume, is waste paper / cardboard. It was going to China and coming back as cardboard.
In some regions, pirated materials derived from metals, petrochemicals, and advanced dyes are immediately destroyed and shoveled into landfills: http://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/steam-rollers-c...
The brown paper bag and the Anchor Hocking jar are going to come back in a big way...
As well they should.
Back when I was growing up we weren't taught to recycle, we were taught the three R's.
1. Reduce 2. Reuse 3. Recycle
And those R's were supposed to be in order of priority.
and is far from unique in doing so..