Mark B Page Chartered Forester

Mixed woodland.

There has been much concern in the past 20 years of the effect on climate of world-wide unsustainable use of natural forests and woodland. This concern has spurred the development of sustainable use of woodlands and forest products, by the forest industry.

However it is not enough to manage woodlands properly if there is not an independent means of proving to the end-user that the wooden item he is buying IS from a sustainable source.

To prove that wood – essential for mans existence on the planet – is from a sustainable source several forest certification schemes have been set up.

FSC need not necessarily be a plantation in the UK.

The two main ones are Forestry Stewardship Council (FSC) and Programme for the Endorsement of Forestry Certification (PEFC). Other schemes, somewhat more regionally based do exist. FSC is the only one recognised by Greenpeace who say:

“FSC, or the Forest Stewardship Council, is the only international forestry certifying organization that supports environmentally appropriate, socially beneficial, and economically viable management of the world's forests.”

The basis for each of these two schemes is that forests (natural woodlands or plantations) are certified as being under sustainable forest management systems. A forest that complies has a certificate issued by the scheme which has audited the forest and forest management enterprise.

Chain of Custody (CoC), either FSC or PEFC, is a means of proving to a potential purchaser that the timber he intends to purchase has come from a well managed forest. The certificate from that woodland is given to the purchaser as proof of this. CoC therefore links the final purchaser with the forest where the product was grown.

The purchaser who wishes to be sure that the product he wishes to purchase from the forest is sustainable then has a means of verifying that it is.

I am the FSC consultant for the for the owner of this Teak plantation.

To sell on the product, after he has processed it he must in turn submit to a rigorous scrutiny of his work procedures and systems, and after compliance he is issued with his own certificate which he can pass on to those who wish to purchase from him. This is known as the Chain of Custody.

These systems are rather demanding in detail, although the principle is simple.

I offer the service of assisting Forest Managers and the Timber using industries to develop their own work systems and develop them into adopted work procedures, which will enable them to achieve compliance with the two main standards.

Please call for a discussion, or use the contact page to email me.