An interesting article in today's The Globe and Mail. The latest edition of the Canadian Yellow Pages has a notice on the cover telling people how they can cancel the delivery of the book. The notice isn't quite as dramatic as the ones you find on cigarette packets nowadays but the idea is essentially the same. The Yellow Pages has started telling people it's an environmental hazard.

The Canadian opt-out scheme isn't a new invention; it has been around since 2009. However, as is the case in the UK, the Yellow Pages tried hard to keep quiet about the existence of the opt-out. Such strategies can only delay the inevitable. Thanks to campaigners such as Aimee Davison of Yellow Pages Mountain (see video) and David Sabine the Canadian Yellow Pages could no longer get away with running a dummy opt-out service. The Yellow Pages is now not only advertising its opt-out scheme, they're also paying for the recycling of the books.

Canadians can opt out online or by phoning 1-800-268-5637. If you're in the UK you can cancel the Yellow Pages, BT Phone Book and/or Thomson Local directory via Junk Buster.

What should happen with Royal Mail? The Adam Smith Institute reckons the company's inexorably decline on the back of competition for the delivery of mostly unwanted junk-mail and the surge in e-mail can be stopped by privatising the whole lot and abolishing the Universal Service Obligation [Link to Adam Smith Institute removed in July 2011 as the page has been removed - JB]. A likely scenario maybe, but not a very popular one.

A solution I haven't heard being mentioned yet is reducing delivery days. If there's less post, why not skip Saturday deliveries, as for instance the US Postal Service is considering? Or why not go even further and deliver mail only every other day? When I suggested this to a Royal Mail manager a while ago I learned that this has actually been considered by the company, but that it's unlikely to ever happen. Partly because people whose birthday falls on a Tuesday would be unhappy if mail is only delivered on Mondays, Wednesday, and Fridays, but more so because Royal Mail's strength is that it delivers mail to every address in the country, six days a week.

Maybe, then, the company should try to take a stake in the online economy. Canada Post has long since recognised that there will soon be hardly any bills to deliver and has come up with epost, a service whereby you receive and manage your bills in a single account. It's something I would definitely sign up for, provided of course that I don't get ejunk.

Have you ever looked in the Yellow Pages to find out how to go about opting out of receiving the directory? If so, you'll have found that this information is not included in the book. Yell seems to have convinced itself that the directory is great for the environment and that having less books printed would amount to an environmental disaster.

So, for those of us who reckon that reducing waste is still preferable over recycling, here is what you need to do to stop the Yellow Polluter…

If you're in the UK you can use Junk Buster to ask Yell to be opted out. At the same time you can send an opt-out request to Thomson Local and BT. If you have no interest in junk mail in general, you can also contact the three main junk mail opt-out services in the UK via Junk Buster. Alternatively, UK householders and businesses can ring Yell on 0800 671 444 or contact the company via this contact form on the Yell website.

In Ireland both the Eircom phone book and Yellow Pages are distributed by Truvo. To opt out, phone 01 46 000 46 or send an e-mail to info@truvo.ie.

The United States has got Yellow Pages Goes Green to get rid off unwanted directories. Via its website you can contact the various organisations that produce Yellow and White Pages. According to the website, these organisations will usually put you on a list if you ask them not to deliver the books, but they cannot be held to account if you continue to find books on your doorstep. However, Yellow Pages Goes Green is confident that the publishers will "act in accordance to the consumer's demands". [The Yellow Pages Goes Green website has since been taken over by the Yellow Pages - JB]

Citizens of United States, Australia, Canada and the UK can also sign a petition calling on the Yellow Pages Association to move to a strictly 'on-demand' system of printing directories at paperlesspetition.org. By signing the petition you are at the same time opting out of receiving the directory. Opting out of the White Pages is optional. [The Paperrless Petition website has also been bought by the Yellow Pages - JB]

In the Netherlands, stopdetelefoongids.nl is campaigning for an opt-out scheme for both the Yellow Pages and the phone book. So far, more than 19,581 people have signed the campaigners? petition for a central opt-out scheme for directories. If all these people would be allowed to opt out, some 35,000 kilos of paper (equivalent to 361 trees) and 17,676 kilos of CO2 would be saved.

Finally, Belgacom, the leading telecommunications company in Belgium, already allows householders to opt-out of receiving the 'white pages'. From the home page of 1207.be you'll find a somewhat hidden link to an opt-out form.

[ Video and link to devinjohnston.ca removed in December 2011 as Devin Johnston has taken down his website - JB ]

This video shows Canadian blogger Devin Johnston returning some junk mail to his MP. The reason? Canadian MPs are allowed to send junk mail at the taxpayer's expense.

In Canada putting a 'No Junk Mail' sign on your letterbox will stop all commercial unaddressed junk mail with immediate effect. Most non-commercial items, such as information about elections and mailings from the House of Commons, will still be delivered. Clearly not everybody agrees with this exemption.

Whatever you make of the video, I reckon the Canadian system is ten times better than ours. Why do we need to register with two ineffective opt-out schemes (Royal Mail's Door-to-Door Opt-Out and the DMA's Your Choice scheme) and get a 'No Junk Mail' sticker? What's the point of the two opt-out 'services'?

If you're in Canada you can get fancy 'No Junk Mail' stickers via the Red Dot Campaign. UK residents can get a sticker from the Stop Junk Mail website.

A new anti-junk mail campaign has been launched in Canada: the Red Dot Campaign. Like Royal Mail in the UK, the Canadian Post Office - Canada Post - allows people to opt out of receiving unaddressed mail by registering with an opt-out scheme. The Red Dot Campaign is encouraging Canadians to do so.

Although Canada Post has never done much to promote its opt-out service the company does seem to be fairly upbeat about people wanting to reduce the amount of unaddressed advertisements they receive. Whereas Royal Mail's marketing strategy is to keep quiet about the Door-to-Door Opt-Out its Canadian counterpart has already acknowledged that encouraging people to opt out makes sense. After all, why would any business want to spend time and resources on targeting the unwilling?

That said, Canada Post has given the Red Dot Campaign a boost by stating that only two per cent of Canadians had opted out of receiving junk mail delivered by the postman because the other 98 per cent actually likes junk mail. The outlandish claim has done much to spread the word about the existence of the opt-out scheme, and got the campaign off to a flying start.

The Red Dot Campaign also promotes 'no junk mail' signs. The Canadian sign is a little red dot with the text 'No Junk Mail Please'. The dot refers to Canadian Post's custom to mark a homeowner's internal file with a red dot if they have opt-out.