Global Challenges for Certification

PEFC Stakeholder DialogueGeneva 26th May 2010

Ben Gunneberg

PEFC Council Secretary General

1

Over last ten years:

Increasing public and consumer awareness and knowledge Increasing involvement by governments at all levels Concept of “corporate social responsibility" adopted – and

implemented – by more and more companies Forest management has become a global procurement issue

The rise of issues such as climate change, social issues, biodiversity – and the potential contribution by forests especially in the tropics

Forest certification is now a solution provider

However….

2

Challenge 1: Expansion of Certification

Only 8% of the world’s forests are certified – have we stalled? Only 26% of the world’s industrial roundwood supply is certified – after

almost 20 years of forest certification 66% of the total area certified to PEFC

8% 26%

66%

3

Challenge 2: Distribution of certification

4

52.8

38.3

5.22.8 2.5 0.9 0.8

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

Western Europe

North America

Oceania CIS Latin America Africa Asia

% o

f to

tal f

ore

st a

rea

180 million ha, 56% of world’s certified forests

82 million ha, 26% of world’s certified forests

CIS = Commonwealth of independent states

Source: UNECE/FAO Forest Products Annual Market Review 2008-2009

Legislation and procurement policies as drivers for sustainable and legal timber stimulate demand for certified product and are welcomed:

Legislation (Lacey Act, Due Diligence Proposal EU) Bilateral Agreements – FLEGT; MoU China & Indonesia, etc Public Procurement Policies (CPET, TPAC, ICLEI, EU Ecoflower etc) Green Buildings initiatives Responsible Purchasing Policies & Codes of Conduct

Need to ensure they remain drivers and do not become barriers

5

Challenge 3: Securing Market Access

PEFC Standards Revision needs to ensure that:

Meta standard requirements are flexible enough to be applicable to all national processes,

Resulting national certification requirements are feasible, realistic and cost-effective.

Both the Meta standard requirements and resulting national certification standards and systems are robust enough to provide confidence to deliver key market and stakeholder expectations

Finding the right balance is the challenge

6

Dialogue Today

Today we will present the results of a year’s work

We want to listen to your views and have discussions aimed at collectively enhancing everyones’ understanding of the issues

This Dialogue builds on the work of multi-stakeholder working groups, complemented by a series of workshops involving specialists, including NGOs, Indigenous peoples, procurement officials, labour unions, scientists and others.

7