FSC-US Standards Revision Process
Click here for Draft 2 v.3 of the FSC-US Family Forest Standard
December 12, 2009
Dear FSC members and stakeholders:
Last month, the FSC-US Board recommended a final draft of the Forest Stewardship Council's US Forest Management Standard to FSC-International (FSC-IC) for final approval.
This draft standard (draft 8.1) was developed based on the comments received from the final 60-day public comment period. Thank you to everyone who submitted written comments and participated in the conference calls. The stakeholder participation was strong, with substantial and detailed input from diverse interests. The FSC-US Standards Committee and Board of Directors considered every comment and deliberated extensively in the process of finalizing the draft to recommend to FSC-IC for approval.
- Click here for a copy of draft 8.1 of the FSC-US Forest Management Standard
- Click here for a summary of stakeholder comments
- Click here for a summary of revisions made in draft 8.1
Regarding next steps, FSC-US will now work closely with FSC-IC to finalize the draft standard for approval. All FSC standards must be approved by FSC's international headquarters in Bonn before they can be used for certification. Any requirements in draft 8.1 are subject to change based on
the FSC-International approval process. Please do not consider draft 8.1 to be the final standard. We expect final approval by early spring 2010, and will keep you updated on the progress of the approval.
Please also recall that draft 8.1 does not include Principle 10 (Plantation management) or Family Forest-specific indicators and guidance.
For more information on the standards revision process, please do not hesitate to contact Karen Steer at ksteer@fscus.org or by phone at 503-260-8335.
Again, thank you for your participation and ensuring forest stewardship!
Best regards,
Corey Brinkema
President
FSC-US
Background on the Forest Management Standard
FSC Forest Management certification follows a robust set of standards - 10 Principles and 56 Criteria designed to protect and enhance biodiversity, water quality, wildlife, timber resources, local communities and public involvement in forest management. These internationally-developed Principles and Criteria (P&C) are used to develop national-level indicators, which third-party auditors use in their certification evaluations. There are currently 278.8 million acres certified by FSC around the world, and 31.7 million acres here in the U.S.
Since January 2008, the Board of Directors-appointed FSC-US Standards Working Group (the ‘crafting body’) and Standards Committee (the ‘decision-making body’) have been working on revising the standards. Both groups comprise diverse representatives from FSC’s three chambers– environmental, social, and economic – and follow a consensus-seeking process in their deliberations.
The revision process included:
- Unifying the regional standards into one national standard with regional variation where appropriate;
- Developing a High Conservation Value Forest (HCVF) Framework to facilitate robust and consistent application of HCVF assessment;
- Including extensive guidance and intent notes to ensure understanding and consistency in the application of the standards;
- Adapting the standards to recognize the new requirement that forest management operations must comply at the Indicator level instead of the Criterion level;
- Including new issues, such as recreation, that emerged since developing the original standards;
- Developing ‘Family Forest’ relevant indicators to address scale issues. This component is being accomplished in a parallel process and a draft standard will be available for public comment later this year.
During the June 2009 FSC-US Board of Directors meeting, a final draft of the Standard, draft 7, was approved for public consultation. After this 60-day comment period, necessary revisions to the Standard will be made by the FSC-US Board of Directors and the approved Standard will be sent to FSC-International (FSC-IC) and Accreditation Services International (ASI) for final approval. |
