Standard Development

A National Forest Standard for Ireland

The draft national standard is now open for public consultation.
Click here for more information.

FSC offers responsible forest owners a certificate to show that they are managing their forests the FSC way – following the highest social, economic and environmental criteria. These forests are independently audited and inspected against a National Standard to ensure forest owners meet these high criteria and so maintain their certification. The reward for forest managers is that they may sell their produce as certified products giving them access to environmentally sensitive markets and giving the public confidence that the product is truly sustainable.

What is a National Standard?

Each country, and sometimes even different regions within countries, prepare a national standard against which responsible forest management may be measured. All National Standards are based on FSC’s ten principles of sustainable forest management which aim to balance the environmental, economic and social aspects of forest management. Each of the ten principles is then translated to reflect the different types of forests found in different regions of the world. This is typically the work of a Standard Development Group and is presently ongoing in Ireland.

What is a Standard Development Group (SDG)?

Each country or region that agrees to undertake the FSC principles of responsible forest management must first establish a National FSC Initiative. In Ireland, this is simply known as “FSC Ireland”. The National Initiative of Ireland is currently developing an appropriate National Standard based on FSC principles. At present, FSC Ireland has assembled an SDG consisting of three chambers, environmental, social and economic and is busy interpreting FSC principles for use in Irish forests. The SDG has received formal training from FSC International in how to interpret the FSC principles and criteria and create verifiers (which are used to verify compliance with the standard in the field) to include into the National Standard.

The members of the Irish Standard Development Group are listed below:

Environmental chamber
Siobhán Egan, Birdwatch Ireland / *Cliona O'Brien, Heritage Council (shared seat)
Dr Ruth McGrath, Voice/IPCC
Dr Evelyn Moorkens, Evelyn Moorkens and Associates
Anja Murray, An Taisce

Economic chamber
Dr Michael Keane, Coillte
Steven Meyen, Teagasc
Geraldine O'Sullivan, Irish Farmers' Association
Paddy Purser, Purser Tarleton Russell Ltd.

Social chamber
Kevin Birchall, Tree Care Ireland
Dr Sasha Bosbeer, GMIT
**Helen Lawless, Wicklow Uplands Council
Peter Sweetman, The Swans and the Snails Ltd

* Cliona O'Brien withdrew March 2009 as a result of it taking more time than had been originally anticipated which couldn't be balanced with existing commitments.

** Helen Lawless resigned from the process in March 2009 as a result of changed economic circumstances and organisational demands within the Wicklow Uplands Council.

How does standard development work?

Each of the ten FSC principles has a number of criteria set against them. The three chambers of the SDG go through each of these meticulously and agree and assign verifiers to meet each of the criteria in an Irish context. These verifiers will then be included into the Irish National Standard. It is these verifiers that internationally accredited auditors will use to assess whether a forest manager is managing his forests in a responsible manner and so may be awarded the FSC Certificate of good forest management.

Forest Testing

The draft standard will be tested in the forest by experienced auditors in Autumn 2009.

Public Consultation

There will be a 70-day public consultation period on the draft national standard, which will take place from 10th August 2009 until 23rd October 2009. Interested parties are welcome to join the Consultative Forum to make formal submissions.