What is Responsible Forest Management?

FSC arose in the wake of the UN Conference on Sustainable Development in 1992 (Rio Summit), when concerned business representatives, social groups and environmental organizations got together and established the Forest Stewardship Council. Its purpose is to improve forest management worldwide.

Responsible and sustainable forest management is now recognised as a major issue globally and is addressed by European and International agreements.

In 1992, the UN Conference on Environment and Development (Rio Summit) in Rio de Janero adopted the Forest Principles. These are not legally binding but a statement of principles addressing management, conservation, and sustainable development of forests.

The Forest Principles include the following ideas:

• international cooperation and exchange of information, while honouring the independence of States to use their own forest resources in line with their own national environmental policies, taking possible environmental damage to other nations into account;
• consideration of intangible costs and benefits, such as environmental costs, into economic decision-making, and specific protection of special areas such as areas of cultural importance or old-growth forests;
• management of forest resources to meet social, economic, ecological, cultural and spiritual needs of present and future generations. These resources include products such as fuel and timber, and services such as provisions of water, medicine, employment, recreation, landscape, and wildlife habitats;
• the importance of forest resources, and the recognition that plantations of native and non-native species can help fulfil demand for timber and fuel;
• accurate information for informed decision-making and understanding among the public and coherent policies;
• encouragement of participation by the public, including explicit involvement of marginal social groups nationally and globally.

Europe

In Europe, sustainable forest management has been defined and developed by the Ministerial Conferences on the Protection of Forests in Europe, sometimes known as the Helsinki Process.

''... sustainable forest management, as a dynamic and evolving concept, aims to maintain and enhance the economic, social and environmental values of all types of forests, for the benefit of present and future generations...'' (from UN General Assembly Non-legally binding instrument on all types of forests, October 2007)

These governmental agreements have been translated into national standards, such as the Irish National Forest Standard.

FSC goes beyond these national standards in providing an independent means of verifying the specific methods used to manage forests sustainably set out in ten international principles.

Sustainable forest management goes beyond the longtime forestry ideal of sustained yield but acknowledges the importance of forests for social and environmental reasons. The FSC International Principles and Criteria set out a standard which is a practical definition of how components of the idea of responsible forest management can be brought into practice. The criteria also provide benchmarks against which auditor can independently verify that the forest is being managed responsibly. This means that if you, the consumer, buy FSC-certified timber or paper with the FSC logo, you can be sure that they were legally felled and sourced from a forest managed well and with due consideration of economic, environmental, and social issues.

Illegally logged wood being imported into Ireland

Responsible forest management practices are important both here in Ireland and abroad. Loss of tropical forest is one of the major factors in increased carbon dioxide in our atmosphere (i.e., global warming).

Ireland is at the very bottom of the ranking of EU countries on use of illegally cut timber, according to WWF, despite an agreed EU Action Plan on Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT). Up to 50% of timber imported into Europe is from illegal sources.