wood product certification (article)

Lumber Labeling:

Wood product certification could mean competitive advantage and an improved image for the lumber industry.

Wood product certification is one of the top issues facing the forest products industry today. Third-party certification tells consumers that the wood they purchase comes from a well-managed or “sustainable” forest operation where good stewardship is practiced. The end-consumer can be confident that certified wood is produced and processed without damage to forest ecosystems.

The history of certification began after several groups tried to “save” tropical rainforests by boycotting the use of tropical hardwoods. By rendering tropical wood valueless via a boycott, the clearing of these forests for unsustainable subsistence agriculture was certain to accelerate. It soon became obvious that these boycotts would not only exacerbate the destruction of rainforests, but would also harm indigenous people and others who were managing forests on a sustainable basis. Concerned environmental activists could see that incentives were a better answer than boycotts which could punish the innocent.

An organization called the Rainforest Alliance proposed their SmartWood program to certify wood as coming from a well-managed or sustainable operation. This certification effort has now expanded to the temperate forest landscape. Today, both SmartWood and Scientific Certification Systems certify the stewardship of tropical and temperate forest operations. While there are several other groups getting involved, these are presently the two leaders.

Certification implies a harvest, so those groups which adamantly oppose harvesting for any reason drop out of the debate. Now the debate becomes; who does the certifying, what will the standards or benchmarks be, and last but not least, will the market pay an inevitable price premium for certified products.

Standards
To become certified by either Scientific Certification Systems’ “Forest Conservation Program” (Green Cross) or by SmartWood, certain criteria must be met in three broad areas: Timber Resource Sustainability, Forest Eco-System Maintenance, and Socio-Economic Benefits.

The Forest Conservation Program of SCS is pass or fail. A minimum score of 80 (out of a possible 100 points) is required before the certified organization can make a public claim. A label would identify the product’s actual score in each of the three categories mentioned above. The claim is specific for a particular region or forest, and must represent a significant percentage of the organization’s forest holdings.

Companies with significant tracks of historically well-managed forest lands, and with the data to back up their claim, have a decided edge. However, a company could have a model operation in one geographic area and could be below standard in another. Presumably, only wood from the model operation would be certified. Companies which source primarily from public lands (i.e., federal, state, county), can only hope that the governmental stewards in charge can produce the necessary information for certification.

Another certification concept is Life Cycle Impact Analysis, or what Scientific Certification Systems call the “Environmental Report Card.” The theory is similar to that of nutrition labels on food products. A food consumer might be concerned about fat or calories, while a wood product consumer might be concerned about global warming or toxic waste. The “Environmental Report Card” label would identify a product’s environmental burdens in terms of energy consumption, and pollution of the soil, air, and water during its production. Any claim on an “Environmental Report Card” would have to be specific to a given company, or represent the lowest possible common denominator in a group of companies.

There is a tremendous amount of work to be done to generate the data for environmental burden labeling. Having two distinct types of certification may also be confusing to be public.

Certifying the Certifiers
Becoming certified doesn’t mean much unless the certifier is a respected and recognizable third party. Both the public and the organization being certified have to look at the reputation, independence and scientific credibility of the certifier. Consequently, there is a new international umbrella group established to accredit the certifiers, called the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC). Both SmartWood and Scientific Certification Systems participate in the Forest Stewardship Council.

The Forest Stewardship Council has a goal of setting a worldwide standard for good forest management. Their mission statement reads: “The Forest Stewardship Council will promote management of the world’s forests that is environmentally appropriate, socially beneficial, and economically viable.” The Council became an official body following its Founding Assembly in Toronto in October, 1993.

The FSC has been formed to become an international accreditation body which would “evaluate, accredit, and monitor certifiers of forest products.” The FSC will not certify forest products. Rather, it will set international standards to which certifiers must adhere. Certifiers of forest products will be evaluated on the basis of their adherence to “FSC Principles and Criteria, and FSC Guidelines for Certifiers”, as outlined below.

1. Compliance with FSC Principles
Forest management practices shall respect all applicable laws of the country in which they occur, and international treaties and agreements to which the country is signatory, and comply with all FSC Principles and Criteria.

2. Tenure and Use Rights
Long-term tenure and rights to the land and forest resources shall be clearly defined, documented, and legally established. 3. Indigenous Peoples’ Rights

The legal and/or customary rights of indigenous peoples to own, use, and manage their lands, territories, and resources shall be recognized and respected.

4. Community Rights and Relations
Forest management operations shall maintain or enhance the long-term social and economic well-being of forest workers and local communities.

5. Optimizing Benefits from The Forest
Forest management shall encourage the optimal and efficient use of the forest’s multiple products and services, in order to ensure economic viability and a wide range of environmental, social, and economic benefits.

6. Environmental Impact
Forest management functions shall maintain the critical ecological functions of the forest and minimize adverse impacts on biological diversity, water resources, soils, non-timber resources, and unique and fragile ecosystems and landscapes.

7. Management Plan
A management plan consistent with FSC principles and appropriate to the scale of the operations shall be written, implemented, and kept up-to-date, clearly stating the objectives of management, and the means of achieving them.

8. Monitoring and Assessment
Regular monitoring should be conducted that assesses the condition of the forest, yields of forest products, chain-of-custody, and management operations and their social and environmental impacts.

9. Relations between Natural Forests and Plantations
Natural forests should not be replaced by plantations. Plantations should complement natural forests and reduce pressures on them.

Certification is in its infancy and in a state of flux. The Forest Stewardship Council is an experiment that may or may not work. It is reasonable to assume that the eight organizations which are currently in the certification business would try to go it alone or form other coalitions if the FSC fails to meet their needs.

Advantages of Certification
In a capitalist free-market economy, every industry and business strives for competitive advantage. Certification offers the forest products industry an opportunity to gain competitive advantage by positioning its products favorably against products with higher environmental burdens. It also offers individual companies within the forest products industry the opportunity to gain competitive advantage over one another.

Certification is a way for companies or agencies which are doing a particularly good job to get some credit. The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources is one example of a governmental body showing interest in getting themselves certified as stewards of sustainable forests. Collins Pine Company certainly benefited by being featured on Charles Kuralt’s Sunday Morning show on CBS for the certification of their Chester, California operation. The company now sells CollinsWood® as certified products. While certification recognizes good practices, it has the potential to encourage changes in poor practices as well.

Because certification requires all parties to look at the same data, and to acknowledge what is being done well, it has the potential to put the “conflict industry” on the sidelines. This is not a debate about whether forests should be managed and harvested, but how to do that in a sustainable manner. According to Eric Bloomquist, CEO of Colonial Craft in St. Paul, Minnesota, certification “changes the dynamics of the resource debate by giving people something measurable to talk about.”

Product certification is not new. It started with the recycled and recyclable logo, of which most people are well aware. We know that it makes most people feel good when they buy products with the logo. Today, recycling is considered socially appropriate. Perhaps it will also become socially appropriate to reuse, reduce, and to use renewable whenever possible.

Unfortunately, the phrase “renewable resources” is now under attack as a slogan of an industry that “just wants to cut more trees.” Certification can prove very powerful against this type of attack, because it verifies that the source is well-managed for the long-term survival of the community and the forest ecosystem.

Certification acknowledges our need for renewable resources and our need to produce them responsibly. As human populations and consumption grow, our demand on finite resources will grow proportionately. We are becoming more aware of our impact on the environment, and of the relatively few options we have for meeting our needs. The time for certification may have come, as a way of acknowledging and rewarding the responsible production and consumption of renewable natural resources.

Will the public pay a premium?
There is a cost associated with “green labeling” to include; separate inventories of certified and non-certified products, which increases the material handling cost, the costs of tracking the certified product through the system to the customer, (i.e. chain of custody), and the costs associated with becoming and remaining certified. The cost of verifying sustainability is likely to increase the price of wood, and everyone in the ‘Good Wood’ business wants to know whether consumers are willing to pay a premium.

Purdue University recently conducted a nation-wide survey of 1,200 consumers, which indicated that consumers have some negative perceptions about domestic and tropical forest practices. The survey also showed that 69 percent of respondents have avoided a product for environmental reasons. Roughly 80 percent of the consumers polled were willing to pay more for assurances of sustainability. In fact, 34 percent said they would pay 6–10 percent more for this assurance. This survey targeted relatively affluent, well educated consumers, and suggests that marketing opportunities exist in the environmental arena for the wood industry.

Conclusion
Virtually every nation in the world, and all main-stream environmental groups have acknowledged the need for sustainable development. Economic development is essential to the quality of life, and to alleviating the problems of population, poverty, and human suffering. The forest products industry has a critical role to play in economic development which is both socially acceptable and ecologically sustainable. Certification appears to be a logical yardstick by which to measure sustainability.

Since evaluation of forest practices is inevitable, it behooves the forest products industry to stay deeply involved in the evolution of certification. The industry is concerned that certification could become another tool to erode private property rights. Since somebody is writing the new rules, the industry should play a key role in making sure those rules are fair, and that they fully consider all of the economic, ecological, and social impacts.

There are currently more questions than answers about certification, but it is an idea whose time has come. Even if the public won’t pay a significant premium for a certified product, all indications are they would chose a certified product over an equally priced non-certified one in most cases. Surveys also indicate that more affluent and better educated consumers are willing to pay some price premium. This means companies which are certified, and/or carry certified products could gain market share. Companies which ignore certification run the risk of losing competitive advantage, or being labeled as defensive. There is no cause to panic or make a rash decision. This is a time for everyone to explore certification, and provide a starting point.

ÆRobert F. Legg
The Lumber Cooperator
Apr. 1994