Forest Certification Council to grow by a third

The PEFC Council, the world?s largest forest certification umbrella organisation for promoting the independent third party certification of sustainable management of forests, is to expand massively. Eight new independent national forest certification schemes from Asia, Australia, South America and Europe are expected to join the nineteen existing member schemes from Europe and North America at the PEFC Council General Assembly this Friday.

According to Mr Ben Gunneberg, Secretary General of the PEFC Council, the membership of the eight new national schemes is a significant step and an excellent prospect for the future for all parties involved in the wood flow from certified sources onto the market place. "News about rapid expansion of forest certification around the world encourages not only forest owners but also timber traders, wood processing industries and retailers to participate in the process and to get their wood flows certified", Mr Gunneberg stated.

Joining the PEFC Council is the first stage for the independent national schemes to participate in the global framework for promoting sustainable forest management. The next stage will be to undergo assessment against the PEFC Council?s requirements. Schemes successfully completing the independent assessment procedures mutually recognise each other under the PEFC Council umbrella, thus facilitating the increasingly international trade of timber from certified sources.

"Co-operation between the national schemes and mutual recognition based on the agreed regulations are the best way to ensure that the wood from each national scheme attains equivalent requirements and can be traded internationally", Mr Gunneberg added. As a result of the new national schemes joining, he expects the PEFC Council to be very busy in the coming years, as the new member schemes would bring to 26 the number of schemes wishing to participate in the mutual recognition process.

For more information contact PEFC Council:

Mr. Heikki Hamunen, Communications Co-ordinator - Tel +352 26 25 90 59 / +358 40 7716652 or
Mr. Ben Gunneberg, PEFC Council Secretary General - Tel +352 26 25 90 59

Editor Notes

Forest certification is a process to provide an assurance mechanism to purchasers of wood and paper products that the wood used in the products comes from sustainably managed forest. Sustainably managed forest are those whose management implements performance standards based on internationally agreed environmental, social and economical requirements.

PEFC is a framework for the mutual recognition of credible national or regional forest certification schemes which have been developed to meet internationally recognised requirements for sustainable forest management. Since its launch in 1999, PEFC has become the largest forest certification umbrella organisation covering national schemes from all over the world, delivering hundreds of millions of tonnes of wood to the processing industry and then onto the market place from tens of millions of hectares of certified forests. PEFC has strong grass roots support from many stakeholders including the forestry sector, governments, trade associations, trade unions and non-governmental organisations.

To date, the PEFC Council has endorsed 13 schemes (out of the 26 member schemes) which account for over 44 million hectares of certified sustainably managed forests.

Schemes endorsed by PEFCC - Hectares certified

• Austrian Forest Certification Scheme - 3.924 000
• Belgian Forest Certification Scheme
• Czech Forest Certification Scheme
• Danish Forest Certification Scheme
• Finnish Forest Certification Scheme - 21.910 000
• French Forest Certification Scheme - 583 908
• German Forest Certification Scheme - 6.047 181
• Latvian Forest Certification Scheme - 17 019
• Norwegian LFS Certification Scheme - 9.352 000
• Spanish Forest Certification Scheme - 86 679
• Swedish Forest Certification Scheme - 2.203 531
• Swiss Q Label Holz Scheme - 64 572
• UK Certification Scheme for SFM

• Australia
• Brazil
• Chile
• Estonia
• Lithuania (effective as of registration of the joining organisation as a legal entity)
• Luxembourg
• Malaysia
• Slovak Republic