PEFC battles with FSC over exclusion from Controlled Wood standards

The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) has decided that PEFC International’s standards are not good enough to meet its Controlled Wood standards.

The decision, contained in a new FSC report, relates to the Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC) International standard, the PEFC national standard in Germany and the PEFC-endorsed Sustainable Forestry Initiative.

FSC said PEFC-certified wood under the three standards highlighted could not be mixed with FSC-certified material without further examination of its origin and the associated risk.

But the report has created confusion as to what happens with PEFC-certified material from other countries where the PEFC national standard differs from the international one.

PEFC International described FSC’s report as an attempt to undermine alternative approaches to certification, “disregarding” years of work to build an international consensus between forest certification schemes.

FSC’s report analysed the schemes, systems and standards of FSC, PEFC and the PEFC-endorsed schemes of PEFC Germany and leading US certification body the Sustainable Forestry Initiative, concluding that PEFC does not meet the requirements of FSC Controlled Wood and so therefore could not be mixed with FSC-certified material without further examination.

“It’s a nonsensical exercise comparing apples to oranges,” responded PEFC secretary-general Ben Gunneberg, who cited the risks of certification schemes engaging in a war of specific criteria.

“There is too much at stake for the public and society as a whole for certification organisations to engage in a cat fight,” he added.

Mr Gunneberg said FSC’s decision was based on its analysis on five criteria from more than 200 sustainability requirements.

He said by not taking advantage of PEFC-certified wood, FSC was making life more difficult for companies to manufacture certified products for consumers.

“Instead of trying to gain market share by restricting fibre from other responsible sources, FSC should rather focus on working with the global forest community to promote the expansion of certification of the world’s forest, especially in the global south.”

Mr Gunneberg said PEFC could pick holes in the FSC system if it wanted to, “but we don’t see any benefit to anyone in doing so”. He called for collaboration rather than confrontation.

An FSC spokesperson said the report stemmed from questions from German certification bodies and certificate holders as to whether PEFC-certified material could be included in the FSC Controlled Wood standard.

She said that some PEFC national schemes may have “stronger” criteria than PEFC International’s standards and so may qualify under the Controllled Wood standard. But FSC has not done any further comparison studies on other PEFC national schemes.

The spokesperson admitted that the criteria of violation of traditional and civil rights (indigenous peoples) was not that relevant for Germany.

But she said that the message from the report was that people “can’t assume that a PEFC-endorsed national standard will meet the requirements for FSC Controlled Wood”.