Forest Management

What is Forest Certification?

Certification is the independent assessment of an organization’s activities against agreed external standards, including those of the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) and the Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI).

The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) has developed an international standard for forest management certification, consisting of ten "Principles and Criteria for Forest Management". These concern the environmental, social and economic impacts of forest management.

The Sustainable Forestry Initiative Standard (SFIS) is based on Nine “Principals for Sustainable Forestry”.  The standard includes thirteen Objectives, with Performance Measures which address Land Management; Procurement; Support for Science, Education and Outreach; Legal Compliance; and Continuous Improvement.

How does Forest Certification work?

Forest certification is applied to the management of a specific, defined forest area.

The forest is assessed by SGS assessors against the requirements of the selected standard(s).

If management of the forest meets the requirements of the standard(s), a certificate is issued.

SGS assessors make regular surveillance visits to ensure that high standards are maintained.

Chain-of-Custody inspections ensure that only products from a certified forest area carry the program’s logos in the marketplace.

Need more information on Forest Management Certification?

The following document contains more detailed information about the certification process. In order to view the document you will need Adobe Acrobat reader available from Adobe.

Please click here to view SGS Forest Management Reports.