Forest and Timber Certification
In view of the worldwide increasing demand for certified timber, and understanding forest and timber certification as an important tool for promoting Sustainable Forest Management (SFM), a number of ASEAN member states embarked during the 1990ies on the development of national forest and timber certification schemes. Several national standards for forest certification of natural and planted forests were created, taking into account the design of ITTOs C&I for SFM of natural tropical forests and/or FSCs Principles and Criteria for forest. On ASEAN level, Regional Criteria and Indicators for Sustainable Management of Natural Tropical Forests were published in 2000.
Photo obtained from Moray McLeish
ASEAN Working Group on a Pan-ASEAN Timber Certification Initiative (AWG-C)
Within the ASEAN member states, the enabling conditions and the situation in the context of forest certification vary significantly. This led to the establishment of the technical Working Group on a Pan-ASEAN Timber Certification Initiative (AWG-C), entrusted with the development of a regional guideline for a Phased-approach to Forest Certification (PACt). The guideline or regional policy framework shall support a step-by-step process to achieve SFM within each member state. The working group ranked the development of a regional timber legality standard as the first phase of the PACt. In this context, the group agreed on six elements to be included in the regional timber legality standard, and currently drafts the related criteria and indicators of the standard, to be further interpreted on member state level.
The AWG has met seven times so far. In 2006, the group agreed on the principles of the PACt and in 2008, the AWG listed six elements to be included in the regional timber legality standard, ranked as the first phase of the stepwise approach. These elements are: (1) Payment of all statutory charges, (2) CITES compliance, (3) Implementation of a system that allows for the tracking of logs to the forest of origin, (4) Compliance with all relevant laws and regulations, (5) The party which harvests the timber shall comply with the laws governing social and environmental aspects, i.e. workers' safety and health, as well as environmental impact assessment, and (6) The timber must be harvested by parties who have the legal rights to carry out the logging at the designated forest area based on an approved cut. The PACt is designed for voluntary third party certification at FMU level. The agreed upon principles of the PACt consider transparency, acceptability, equitability, comparability, incentives and disincentives, and public consultation.
The AWG currently develops the criteria and indicators of the ASEAN
timber legality standard (based on the agreed upon six elements) and
drafts a regional guideline on Chain-of-Custody (CoC). National
interpretations of the regional timber legality standard shall follow.
The AWG conducted several capacity building activities on
certification, legality verification and changing requirements of
international timber markets. Workshops and trainings were hosted by
individual ASEAN Member States. More regional and national capacity
building activities are planned. The next regular meeting of the AWG
takes place in Brunei in February 2009.
Some ASEAN member states
work on additional measures for a more responsible and sustainable
trade in forest products through the development of a national Timber
Legality Assurance System (TLAS). Malaysia, Indonesia and Vietnam are
in the process of negotiating Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and
Trade (FLEGT) Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPA) with the EU, in
which a TLAS is the core element.
The development of national verification systems for ensuring compliance with the ASEAN legality standard and the adoption of a regional chain-of-custody guideline will help to further develop ASEAN's forestry sector by improving performance standards and ensuring access of timber exports to important international markets like Europe and the US. Such developments not only require political will but also technical and methodological knowledge and understanding in national institutions. Consequently, the Working Group on a Pan-ASEAN Timber Certification Initiative regularly conducts related capacity building activities.
