Paper industry used to be one of the heaviest polluters in Finland. And we have a paper mill up the river route on the waters near me. Local people tell stories of 60's and 70's when the environmental legislation wasn't that strict - the local waters were stinking and bubbling with foam, and the fish contained heavy doses of mercury. Still, people fished, and then released the fish in separate small ponds where they let the fish stay for months, so that they got at least a little purified... (There is some data that in this region particular forms of cancer are much more common than the average in Finland - but nobody knows the exact cause of this...)

All in all, what I mean is that things definitely got better since 1980's =) Or, at least in the majority of western countries. I'd guess the change to better is happening everywhere, just one or more decades later.