Also in this section:

Principles and Criteria

Current FSCUS Regional Standards

FSCUS Standards Revision Process

FSCUS Standards Review

Family Forests Program

Regional Standards Review:

Executive Summary and Overviews

Final Assessments

Cross-cutting Issues

Background and Supporting Documents

Cross-cutting or meta-issues

Two documents were created as a result of the Standard Review that are explicit explorations of two cross-regional issues addressed in the SRP. The first document addresses the SRP regional configuration assessment and recommendation for development of a national standard. The second document addresses the SRP recommendation for development of Indicators specific to the Family Forest Program (FSC SLIMF policies).

Regional standards and regional configurations

The SRP proposes that FSC-US adopts a national standard that incorporates regional variations. Recognition of regional, state, and local variation is of utmost importance in FSC standards. This recognition is important not only to reflect regional differences in legal, social, economic, and environmental conditions, but also to reflect preferences of local stakeholders, a key component of the FSC system and something that distinguishes it from other certification systems. The argument is made that for harmonization or unification to a national standard is not to limit intentional and logical regional variation.

Regional standards and regional configurations

Family Forest Program

The SRP concludes that the current standards do not achieve the goal of being approachable from the perspective of a Family Forest owner or manager. In addition, it is evident from reviewing the Indicators and feedback from assessors and managers that the Indicators often are difficult to audit or implement at the Family Forest level. Issues with the standards exist stemming from the broad use of technical language, difficulties in measuring compliance at an FFP level, and impractical or unachievable requirements.

Family Forest Program