FERN’s aim is to encourage certification schemes to implement standards which recognise forest peoples’ rights and improve forestry practices and legislation. Our work on timber procurement aims to push the EU and Member States to consider certification, rights and forestry practices in their procurement policies.
FERN’s analysis: Certification is now a mainstream issue that can affect the decisions behind virtually every item we buy. However, when it comes to timber, there are serious problems translating this into improvements on the ground. Certification schemes are often dominated by the forestry industry or forest owners and even if this is not the case, certification bodies are increasingly certifying operations with very poor forest management practices that don’t recognise the rights of local communities.
What FERN is doing: FERN supports groups to campaign against problematic certification operations or schemes whilst working to improve the policies of the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) and ensure they are implemented. FERN is also actively involved in getting the EU and Member States to have clear timber procurement policies which outlaw purchasing from non-certified sources.
To learn more about this campaign: see FERN’s statement on FSC, Footprints in the forest and buying a sustainable future.
This report analyses the different timber procurement policies of six EU Member States and Japan. The report shows that although there is some variation between the different policies, there are also many similarities. The NL policy is the strongest in terms of inclusion of social issues with the UK policy does not (yet) include; FR and DE just accept certain certification schemes and the DK policy is not mandatory. The new EU procurement policy aims to ensure the other 21 Member States will also develop some policies. So more to come...