A business creates a huge amount of information and records, many of these are still paper based even with today's technology. Document management is key in ensuring that you can find required documents as it relates to regulatory agencies such as tax and employment authorities and documents also need to be retained for your accountants to prepare tax returns, financial statements, etc. If you just try and throw it all in a shoe box you will have a mess. Just look at a company like Enron who shredded documents for 2 days, and still only got through a fraction of what they wanted to shred. Documents are everywhere and they need to be managed through proper storage and destruction.
Less paper consumption means a lot less trees being cut down and used and therefore the problem is almost immediately rectified by simply cutting down paper use in your working life or even using none at all.