With much of the large state and commercial forest lands in the industrialised world already certified, both FSC and PEFC have identified Russia as a key target for future expansion in certified forest area. Buyers in western Europe and Japan have also been pushing forest certification onto the agenda in Russia. There are significant challenges, but they are being overcome and there are signs that certification may be about to take off.

FSC has played a critical role to initiate certification in Russia. A major obstacle has been an almost complete lack of certification capacity in the country. There is no national accreditation system to recognise certifiers and, until recently, there were no domestic certification bodies. However, FSC operates procedures that allow certification in countries where such facilities are absent. Forestry audits are carried out by certification bodies accredited at international level rather than through national processes. Certification may also be undertaken against “generic standards” adapted by the certification body from the international FSC Principles and Criteria. These generic standards are intended to be used to provide examples of good forestry in countries until such time as an FSC-endorsed standard, developed through a fully-participatory process at national or sub-national level, is available.

Generic standards

Generic standards have been used to good effect in Russia to provide models of good practice, encouraging others to see the advantages of forest certification. This, combined with strengthening market demand for the FSC label, has meant that FSC has acquired a strong base of support in Russia, especially in the paper manufacturing and sawmilling sectors, with companies that are directly engaged in exporting value-added products to western Europe and Japan. Several leading players – including Ilim Pulp, Archangelsk Pulp and Paper, Mondi, IKEA Russia, Onega (the fourth largest sawmill in Russia) and Cherepovetsles (the largest harvesting company in the European part of Russia) – have been heavily engaged in the FSC process in Russia.

Distributors in the UK have been instrumental in encouraging the early shift to FSC. Peter Hunt, purchasing manager of Howarth Timber Group, a major UK importer of Russian softwood, says the company has been pushing all suppliers to achieve certification, a requirement driven by Howarth’s own commitment to The Timber Trade Federation’s Responsible Purchasing Policy. Howarth’s leading Siberian supplier, which is capable of delivering around 100,000m3 of FSC-certified lumber each year, now exports FSC-certified wood to the UK as standard, without charging a premium. Mr Hunt notes that supplies from the Archangel region have been less consistent, but the situation is improving.

The area of FSC-certified forest in Russia has been rising rapidly. According to FSC Russia, taking account of operations just certified or now completing the certification process, the area of FSC-certified forest will rise from around 13 million ha at the end of 2006 to 24 million ha by the end of this year. If so, Russia will overtake Canada as host to the world’s largest area of FSC-certified forest and will account for around one-quarter of all FSC-certified forest. FSC-certified forest would also account for 20% of all forest lease holdings in the Russian Federation.

While FSC has led the early development of forest certification in Russia, the process is entering a new phase. As Russian stakeholders have become more engaged in the certification process, there has been growing pressure to develop systems and standards more closely adapted to Russian conditions and less dependent on external certification capacity. With respect to FSC, the reliance on certification bodies’ generic standards, rather than a consensus-based national standard, is beginning to create tensions. There have been instances of community groups objecting to FSC certification on grounds that their concerns were not adequately considered during the process. This has been an issue, for example, with the FSC certification of the Komi Model Forest Project. Disputes have also arisen over the precise location and size of areas that should be defined under FSC procedures as “High conservation value forests”.

National initiative

Ultimately such disputes may only be resolved through effective stakeholder dialogue at national and sub-national level. Within the FSC, these issues are being tackled through a national initiative bringing together a range of economic, social and environmental social interests. This initiative has developed a “Russian framework national FSC standard” and set up four regional working groups to develop locally appropriate standards.

Meanwhile concerted moves are under way to develop national certification initiatives that are seeking recognition under the PEFC umbrella. Development of these initiatives is also a response to market demand, particularly from the large Scandinavian groups that supplement their log supplies by importing from north-west Russia. For example, each year the Finnish group Metsäliitto buys around 3.4 million m3 of logs, about 10% of its entire log supply, from Russia. At a recent certification workshop in Moscow, a Metsäliitto representative reported that 75% of the company’s wood supply is already certified, the majority under PEFC. He encouraged Russian suppliers to pursue PEFC certification.

Two national forest certification frameworks have evolved in Russia, referred to respectively as the RSFC and the FCR. The process to develop the RSFC was initiated by the Union of Timber Merchants and Timber Exporters, and has been developed in association with various timber industry research associations, a union of forest owners, and the Russian Federal Ministry of Industrial Science. The RSFC development process has focused exclusively on PEFC endorsement and received financial support from Finnish forest interests.

Bridging two schemes

The FCR initiative aims to act as a bridge between the PEFC and FSC initiatives in Russia. It has been supported by the Ministry of Natural Resources with funding from the World Bank. FCR has a partnership agreement with the FSC and is involved in a process to harmonise with the FSC standard. It also has an umbrella agreement to jointly represent PEFC in Russia with the RSFC.

Both the FCR and RSFC recently submitted certification schemes for PEFC endorsement. Until Russia has its own national accreditation service, both schemes will rely on certification bodies accredited by national agencies in other countries.

According to Allan Flink, forest industry consultant at Indufor Oy, a company which has been heavily engaged in advising both the RSFC and FCR, one or other of the certification schemes is likely to achieve PEFC endorsement within the next 12 months. He also said that an expected outcome of the move to forest certification will be the establishment of more Russian certification bodies and, longer term, the creation of a Russian accreditation service. This highlights the role that the forest sector is playing internationally, at the forefront of efforts to develop global certification capacity that may be applied to all industrial sectors, not just forestry.

The interaction between the two national certification systems is an interesting feature of the Russian certification process. The FCR and RSFC are co-operating for purposes of PEFC membership and intend to work together to manage chain of custody certification. But the two initiatives will compete to certify forestry operations. According to PEFC secretary-general Ben Gunneberg, this competition has potential to drive rapid uptake of PEFC certification in Russia. He reckons that between 50-100 million ha may be PEFC certified within the next 10 years.