Footprints in the forest - Fern

PEFC 

Footprints in the forest 

Current 

practice 

and future 

challenges 

in forest 

certification

The Pan-European Forest 

Certification (PEFC) 

Scheme, an update 

by Elisa Peter 

Taiga Consulting A.B. 

July 2003 

1

Table of Contents 

Introduction 3 

Conclusions 4 

Overview of all PEFCC members and operational schemes in Europe 8 

PEFC Sweden 20 

PEFC France 28 

PEFC Germany 35 

Annex 1: List of PEFCC members 42 

Annex 2: PEFC Belgium Charter 45 

Annex 3: Questionnaire 48 

References 51 

2

I. Introduction 

The purpose of this report is to present an update of the four PEFC schemes which were 

described in the report Behind the Logo (FERN, 2001) (Sweden, Finland, Germany and 

France) and to provide an overview of all the other operational PEFC schemes in Europe 

as regards to their decision making processes and geographical scope. Taiga Consulting 

was commissioned by FERN to facilitate the study. Elisa Peter has been doing the 

research and writing. The work was conducted in June and July 2003. 

In order to gather information on the four main schemes (Sweden, Finland, Germany and 

France), a questionnaire was developed and sent to both the main environmental 

organization following certification issues and to the PEFC contact person in the 

respective countries. The questionnaire was sent on June 6 2003 and respondents were 

given 3 weeks to respond. The last responses to the questionnaire arrived on July 11 and 

were still considered and used in the study. Subsequently the full report was sent to the 

PEFC Council for comments in December 2003 before publication in February 2004. 

Welcome comments from PEFC schemes in Finland and Germany were taken on in the 

final report, as well as relevant comments from the Secretary General of the PEFC. 

The overview of other operational schemes was mostly based on web research although 

NGOs were also contacted in those cases where it was not possible to get any relevant 

information from the national PEFC web sites. The original of the web pages mentioned 

in the notes are with the author. 

When responses to the questionnaire were received, they varied greatly both in the 

quantity and quality of the information provided. It was possible to carry primary 

research in Sweden in order to fill the information gaps but given available time and 

resources this was unfortunately not possible for the other countries. Follow up 

questions of clarification were sent to most respondents (when they were not away on 

holidays) in an attempt to make the country chapters as consistent and comparable with 

each other. However, the various country chapters still contain different kind of 

information to a certain extent. The information is mostly factual and referenced. When it 

was not possible to find a reference for potentially controversial information, the 

information was not included in the final document. 

The conclusions include an attempt to summarize identified common elements of the 

PEFC schemes, based on the information, which was collected during the study. The 

conclusions focus on these criteria, which were included in the first edition of FERN’s 

report “Behind the Logo”, available at www.fern.org. 

Before publication, in January 2004, this report was sent by FERN to the General 

Secretary of the PEFC Council as well as to representatives of PEFC Finland and PEFC 

Germany, both of whom had contacted FERN to be able to comment on the report before 

publication. Where considered relevant, their comments were taken on in this version of 

the report. 

3

II. Conclusions 

The main purpose of this study was to assess the main changes, which had occurred 

within PEFC since the first edition of the report Behind the Logo (FERN, 2001). 

The most striking change is the rapid expansion that the system has undergone since 

2001. There are now thirteen national certification standards, which have been endorsed 

by the PEFC Council in thirteen different European countries, as opposed to only five in 

2001. More are in the process of seeking endorsement by the PEFC Council. The PEFC 

schemes now account for over 47 million hectares of certified forests (compared to 32 

million in 2001) and 600 Chain of Custodies certificates – a number that is rising almost 

on a daily level. 

Since 2001, a number of structural improvements have taken place, which are reflected in 

the new policy documents published by the PEFC Council in November 2002. These 

changes are to a large extent a follow up on an independent review of the system (which 

was contracted by the PEFC Council itself). The most important policy changes include: 

- the regular revision of the national standards on forest and chain of custody at 

least every 5 years. The documents specify that the revision procedures shall be 

participatory, fair and transparent, 

- the preparation of an international standard on Chain of Custody certification to 

harmonize the CoC certification procedures at the national level. 

It is also encouraging to note that the large majority of the certification bodies carrying out 

certification against the PEFC standard are now accredited by the respective national 

accreditation bodies in most of the countries, which was not the case in 2001 (when nonaccredited 

certification bodies were delivering PEFC certificates). 

Last, both in Sweden and in Germany, steps have been taken to increase the transparency 

of the certification process by publishing summary reports on the PEFC web sites. 

However, the PEFC system remains weak on some of the points which have been most 

criticized by environmental NGOs, namely participation, voting procedures and 

transparency. The decision making structure continues to allow for a large power 

imbalance between economic and other interests, where environmental and social interests 

can be systematically overruled during the voting process. Participation is not required 

either during the standard setting process or the certification process. Assessment and/or 

summary reports of certification have been difficult if not impossible to get hold of by 

interested parties and there is not clear and consistent mechanism in place for interested 

parties to bring forward a complaint on the accreditation and/or certification outcomes. 

The following weaknesses are common to most if not all the operational PEFC schemes, 

which were reviewed during the assessment: 

4

1- Weak participation of all interested parties in standard setting processes 

Environmental and social interests have in most cases refrained from participating in the 

PEFC standard setting processes and governing structures. The exception is France where 

a large coalition of environmental organizations (France Nature Environment) was 

involved in the national standard setting process and is currently actively participating in 

the setting of regional PEFC processes. In other countries (Germany, Latvia), small 

environmental and social NGOs are participating in the PEFC process but no large 

environmental organizations has been involved. In Sweden, a bridging document between 

FSC and PEFC was produced in collaboration between PEFC, FSC and environmental 

NGOs and the exercise did lead to a few improvements in the Swedish PEFC standard. 

However, no Swedish environmental NGOs are directly participating in the Swedish 

PEFC process. The PEFCC encourages the “consultation” of all interested parties during 

the standard setting process at the national level but active participation is not required. 

2- Decision making and voting procedures which favor forestry interests 

In all the PEFC schemes, which were reviewed, decision-making power rests largely with 

forest industry/forest owners during standard setting as well as system development and 

maintenance. Even if/when social and environmental interested parties participate in 

decision making processes, the distribution of voting power is such that they can always 

be overruled by the joint votes of the forest owners and forest industry representatives. 

There is still no example of a PEFC scheme where social, environmental and economic 

interests have equal voice and decision-making power. 

3- Lack of transparency and multi-stakeholder consultation during the 

certification process 

Neither full assessment reports nor summaries thereof are made publicly available to 

interested parties in any of the schemes, which were reviewed, expect in Germany. None 

of the national PEFC web sites visited contained any assessment/summary report (except 

in Germany, although NGOs complain that the excerpts which are published are not very 

informational) and in France, WWF reported that PEFC declined their request for getting 

copies of certification reports. However, PEFC Sweden will require the web publication 

of summary reports from the beginning of 2004. 

4- A new International CoC certification standard expected 

CoC certification at the national level is currently based on the general CoC procedure, 

which were developed by the PEFCC in February 2000 and revised in November 2002. It 

is planned that this document will be replaced by an International Chain of Custody 

Standard, which is currently being developed. In the meantime, national schemes continue 

to apply the three approaches that were already in use in 2001 (input-output system; 

minimum average percentage system; physical segregation). 

5- Voluntary certification at the regional level 

The vast majority of PEFC schemes continue to certify entire regions at once (exceptions 

being Sweden, Norway and Switzerland). Although the procedures and terminology vary 

slightly from country to country, a regional certificate is usually issued by a third party 

certifier to a regional applicant entity, which in effect implies that all forests included in 

the region become automatically “certifiable”. Field visits of all participant forest owners 

5

efore a regional certificate is issued are not required. However, forest owners have to 

take an active (and voluntary) step in order to join the regional certification by signing an 

agreement with the regional entity. Only the forests of those forest owners who 

committed to minimum requirements (by signing the agreement) are considered as certified 

forests. Internal monitoring visits carried out by the regional applicant (and certificate 

holder) take place on a regular basis although the sampling procedures are most of the 

time vague and do not seem to ensure that all forests within a regional certification 

schemes are checked. In Sweden, field visits are mandatory before a forest is certified, 

which is not the case in most regional certification schemes (France, Germany). 

Stakeholders consultation during the certification process is not required in any of the 

PEFC schemes which were reviewed. 

6- A system-based approach 

Although a proper comparison of the national PEFC standards currently operational in 

Europe was beyond the scope of this study, it seems like the majority of the PEFC 

schemes still lack performance based requirements (except for Sweden). Certification is 

based on a process, which focuses on assessing documents provided, by the applicant 

entity rather than on an evaluation of forestry practices on the ground. The regional and 

individual applicants alike make certain commitments as regards to environmental aspects 

of forest management, for the most system rather than performance based. The 

commitments determine the goals the operation will strive to achieve and the certification 

body assesses compliance with the steps defined to reach these goals. 

7- Unclear complaints procedures 

The responsibility for handling complaints as regards to PEFC certification is usually 

divided between the accreditation body, the certification body and PEFC. The 

accreditation body usually has procedures in place to handle complaints regarding the 

accreditation process, but nothing specific for accreditation of PEFC certifiers. 

Certification bodies are also required to have mechanisms in place to deal with 

complaints. However since neither accreditation reports nor certification reports are 

publicly available, it is difficult for third party to bring forward complaints. Most of the 

complaints are therefore coming directly from applicants. There has hardly been any so 

far. 

8- Lack of guidance for certification bodies 

Sweden is the only country where the national accreditation body developed a (relatively 

weak) document in cooperation with PEFC Sweden with specific requirements to guide 

certification bodies certifying against the PEFC criteria. In all the other countries, there are 

no forest-specific, PEFC specific guidance for certification bodies apart from the general 

policy document on certification and accreditation procedures of the PEFCC. Because the 

PEFCC procedures are very general, it is questionable whether two certification bodies 

would come up with the same outcome if they were asked to certify one same entity 

against the same national standard. 

9- Uneven quality of the accreditation procedures 

PEFC requires that certification bodies be accredited by the national accreditation bodies 

in their respective countries. In some cases (France) any certification body which has 

6

een accredited to conduct general certification (ISO 45012) is entitled to conduct 

certification against the PEFC standard. In most countries (except Sweden) there is no 

specific accreditation procedure for accrediting certification bodies certifying against the 

PEFC standard. There are therefore no mechanisms in place to ensure that the 

certification body has forest-specific competence and experience with social and 

environmental issues. 

7

III Overview of all PEFCC members and 

operational schemes in Europe 

The information included here is mostly based on web research, with the exception of 

PEFC Germany, Sweden, France and Finland. The web sites of the PEFC Council and of 

the respective PEFC national schemes were screened for information on decision making 

procedures, voting power of various stakeholders and whether the scheme prescribes for 

regional certification and/or individual and group certification at the Forest Management 

Unit (FMU) level. 

The quality and contents of the respective web sites vary greatly. In some cases, there is 

hardly any information available as regards to the contents of the standard and 

certification procedures while others have comprehensive and detailed information on the 

requirements of the standard as well as the certification procedure. Where information 

was lacking, NGO contact persons in the respective countries were contacted to the 

extent possible (Austria, Belgium, Latvia, Norway, Switzerland). 

None of the national web sites which were visited contained: 

- information about decision making procedures 

- assessment reports and/or summaries thereof 

3.1 The Pan European Forest Certification scheme in the world 

As of May 30 2003, the Pan European Forest Certification Council (PEFCC) had twenty 

six members in twenty six different countries throughout Western and Eastern Europe, 

North America, South America, Asia and Australasia (see Annex 1). 

The most recent members, which were accepted at the November 2002 General Assembly 

of the PEFC are: Australia, Brazil, Chile, Estonia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malaysia and 

Slovakia 1 . 

Expressions of interest have also come from organizations in Belarus, Bulgaria, Greece, 

Hungary, Poland, Romania, the Russian Federation and the Ukraine 2 . 

Thirteen national certification standards have had their schemes endorsed by the PEFCC 

(see table below). These schemes now account for over 47 million hectares of certified 

forests and 600 Chain of Custodies certificates – a number that is rising almost on a daily 

level. 

The thirteen other member schemes are at various stages of development and will be 

seeking endorsement and mutual recognition under the PEFC umbrella in the near future 3 . 

1 PEFC Austria Newsletter 6/02 – December 2002 

2 PEFCC. http://www.pefc.org June 2003 

8

Forest and CoC PEFC certificates as of 30/4/2003 

Endorsed scheme Certified forest Number of CoC Number of PEFC 

areas (ha) certificates logo users 

Finland 21 910 000 66 80 

Norway 9 352 000 3 12 

Germany 6 425 314 225 5376 

Austria 3 924 000 184 112 

Sweden 2 276 444 31 75 

Czech Republic 1 870 432 5 36 

France 1 410 158 81 1724 

Spain 86 679 0 7 

Switzerland 64 572 0 0 

Latvia 17 081 8 113 

UK 9 125 1 1 

Belgium 0 2 3 

Italy 0 2 2 

PEFC Council 0 0 16 

Total 47 345 806 608 7 557 

Source: PEFCC. www.pefc.cz/register/statistics.asp June 2003 

It is worth mentioning that 6 of the 13 PEFC schemes operational as of May 2003 were 

officially approved by SIS Miljömärkning, which is owned by the Swedish Standard 

Institute SIS. These are Austria, Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, Finland and Germany. 

This means that PEFC certified products in those countries are authorized to carry “The 

Nordic Swan” Eco-label 4 . 

According to WWF Sweden, Nordic Swan had – a few years ago – relatively high 

standards for endorsement of forest certification schemes in eco-labelled products (paper 

etc), including a strong emphasis on a broad participatory process. According to WWF 

Sweden, they were however forced to lower their standard after pressure from PEFC and 

the forest industry in 2001 5 . Seventeen Nordic environmental NGOs criticized them for 

this 6 . 

3 PEFCC. http://www.pefc.org/news.htm June 2003 

4 PEFC Austria Newsletter 5/02 October 2002 

5 Per Larsson, WWF Sweden. Personal communication, July 6, 2003 

6 Press release WWF Sweden and SSNC. Svanen släpper sitt ansvar för skogen. January 26, 2001. 

9

3.2. Decision making structure and level of certification (region/FMU) 

of European PEFC schemes operational as of May 2003 

AUSTRIA 

Name of the national PEFC Governing Body: PEFC Austria 

Endorsed by the PEFCC in: September 2000 

Number of hectares certified as of April 30 2003: 3 924 000 

Decision making structure/voting with regard to standard development: 

The current members of the PEFC Austria board are – according to the PEFC Austria 

website – Fachverband der Holzindustrie Österreichs (association of Austrian timber 

industry), Fachverband der Papierindustrie Österreichs (association of Austrian paper 

industry), Bundesgremium des Holz- und Baustoffhandels Österreichs (representatives of 

wood and construction material traders of Austria), Umweltdachverband UWD, 

Präsidentenkonferenz der Landwirtschaftskammern Österreichs (representatives of the 

agricultural sector), Hauptverband der Land- und Forstwirtschaftsbetriebe Österreichs 

(federal association of farmers and forest owners), Bundeswaldbauernverband (federal 

association of small forest owners), Vertreter der Gewerkschaften (trade unions) 7 . 

Environmental interests are not represented on the board. PEFC Austria does however 

recognises the “extraordinary importance of consensus among all participating interest 

groups” 8 . According to information on the web site, every member in the National 

Governing Body has one vote and decisions are only made by consensus 9 . 

Regional certification and/or FMU level certification: 

The Austrian PEFC scheme theoretically allows for regional certification as well as group 

and individual certification at the FMU level. In practice, PEFC Austria has adopted a 

regional certification system, which lead to the certification of all 9 Austrian forest 

regions, representing about 200,000 forest owners by February 2002 10 . 

According to a report written for the Ministerial Conference on the Protection of Forests 

in Europe in 2002, 100% of Austrian forests have been PEFC-certified 11 , while an 

increasing percentage is being certified by FSC 12 (at present there are only around 3,600 

ha of FSC certified forests). 

The argument used by PEFC Austria to opt for regional certification rather than 

individual certification is a financial one (PEFC certification costs in Austria are of 

7 

PEFC Austria. http://www.pefc.at. June 2003 

8 

Ibid 

9 

Ibid 

10 

PEFC Austria Newsletter, Vol.1 February 2002 

11 

Report on the Implementation of Ministerial Conference on the Protection of Forests in Europe 

(MCPFE): commitments for the fourth ministerial conference on the protection of forests in Europe – 

Austria, July 2002 (page 6) 

12 

PEFC Austria. http://www.mcpfe.org/livingforestsummit/secure/ktools/phplib/MedienDatenbankView.inc.php?id=60 

June 2003 

10

10cents/ha for the forest owner 13 ). Ten forest owners have applied for individual PEFC 

forest certification 14 . Group certification occurs for CoC certification but it was not 

possible to find detailed description of the procedure on the web site. 

Other: 

There is no indication on the PEFC Austria web site that the regional certification process 

entails field visits before a certificate is issued. The only requirement to fulfil before a 

forest owner can become certified is to “voluntarily recognize the PEFC criteria by 

signing the declaration of obligation” 15 . 

However, “on-site monitoring” was conducted during the regional re-audits in 2003 16 but 

it is unclear if those visits included field visits. There is no mention of environmental and 

social criteria in the re-audits (the aspects re- audited included business activities, system 

stability, entrepreneurial investment, work safety and damage by wild game 17 ). 

Certification reports are not publicly available. Even after several written requests from 

WWF Austria, PEFC Austria has consistently refused to make available or publish the 

audit reports 18 . 

BELGIUM 

Name of the national PEFC Governing Body: Woodnet asbl. 

Endorsed by the PEFCC in: February 2002 

Number of hectares certified as of April 30 2003: 0 

The www.woodnet.com web site given by the PEFCC as the contact for PEFC Belgium 

is actually the homepage of a Belgian association, WoodNet, uniting actors of the Belgian 

wood sector, including the timber, pulp and paper industry, forest owners, forest owners 

associations, the wood processing industry and wood trading houses. The main purposes 

of Woodnet are “to promote timber and its derivatives” and “to promote and set up 

European certification PEFC” 19 . WoodNet was established in 1997 by a forest owners 

association: the Royal Society of Private Forest Owners (SRFB). SRFB coordinates the 

activities of WoodNet A.S.B.L., which is curerntly responsible for facilitating the work of 

the Belgian PEFC 20 . 

13 PEFC Austria Newsletter 1/02 January 2002 

14 PEFC Austria http://www.pefc.at/zertifizierte_betriebe_logo/ 

15 Gernot Arnold, PEFC regional representative, quoted in PEFC Austria Newsletter 1/02 January 2002 

16 PEFC Austria Newsletter 8/03 April 2003 

17 PEFC Austria Newsletter April 20003 

18 Press release by WWF Austria – April 2003 

19 http://www.woodnet.com/en/filliere/fedhome.asp?fedid=18&lg=FR&mb=M June 2003 

20 PEFC Belgium. Belgian Forest Certification Scheme – version 3 (no date mentioned) 

11


The board of PEFC Belgium consists of a maximum of 14 seats distributed as follows (the 

number in brackets indicates how many of the seats available are currently filled) 21 : 

- 4 representatives of forest owners and managers (3) 

- 1 representative of primary wood processing industry (sawmills) - (1) 

- 1 representative of secondary wood processing industry - (e.g. panel industry 

..)(1) 

- 2 representatives of environmental NGOs (2) 

- 2 representatives of consumer organisations (1) (in fact these are the hunters 

association) 

- 1 representative of trade unions (1) 

- 1 representative of scientific institution (1) 

- 1 representative of the retailers and /or import sector (1) 

- 1 representative of WoodNet (1) 

As the numbers above show, more than half of the seats are reserved for forestry 

interests. 

There is no information about voting procedures among the board. It is unclear if the 

board votes by simple majority or not 22 . 


Although PEFC Belgium claims that certification can theoretically be conducted both at 

regional and individual levels, the PEFC document on operational procedures stipulates 

that “the level chosen for certification is the regional level” 23 . Three regions have been 

defined and a working group established in the Walloon region to develop a regional 

standard. “The objective [of certification] is to prove that the Walloon Region, as a whole 

is managed in accordance with the Belgian Scheme for sustainable forest management 

certification” 24 . A regional standard setting process has also been initiated in Flanders 

although the working group is not yet operational. 

In practice, once a region or a group of owners is certified, each property becomes 

certifiable. Individually, each manager and/or owner must sign a “charter” to confirm that 

they commit “to manage their forest in accordance with the regional objectives”, thereby 

confirming their participation in the regional or group certification. The charter (see Annex 

2) includes 13 points including legal and forestry management requirements. 

21 

PEFC Belgium. Règlement d’Ordre Intérieur de la Commission PEFC Belgique (25/01/02) and 

Commission Constituante du PEFC Belgique – rapport de la réunion de 25/01/2002 

22 

Ibid 

23 

PEFC Belgium. Operational Procedure for Forestry Certification. Monday 22 January 2001 

24 

Ibid 

12

An internal audit will check that the owners/managers who have signed the charter “are 

assuming their commitments”. An external audit is also carried out by the certification 

bodies (which should be accredited by the Belgian accreditation body Belcert), which will 

assess whether the owner/manager is aware of the requirements laid down in the charter 

they have signed and is implementing them. The certification bodies are required to “go 

and see several property managers involved in the certification system, in order to check 

that they have implemented the necessary practices in terms of their commitments” 25 . 

The audits are performed with a sampling procedure on the square root of the number of 

participants (i.e. 20 control for 400 participants every year) 26 . 

Forest owners can be excluded from the group/regional certification scheme in case of noncompliance 

with the charter they have signed following the internal or external audit. 

CZECH REPUBLIC 

Name of the national PEFC Governing Body: Czech Forest Certification Scheme 

(CFCS) 

Endorsed by the PEFCC in: June 2001 

Number of hectares certified as of April 30 2003: 1 870 432. This represents about 

68% of the total Czech forestland. Of those around 100,000 ha belong to private forest 

owners, 165,000 ha are in communal ownership and 1,5 million ha are state forests (which 

are now completely certified) 27 . 


It was not possible to find information about the standard setting process on the web 

site 28 . The Czech National Governing Body “consists of main interested groups in the 

field, which is the subject of the Czech Forest Certification Scheme” 29 . It is unclear how 

and by whom interested parties are identified and if any parties representing social and 

environmental interests participated in the standard setting process or are members of the 

National Governing Body. 


The Czech PEFC scheme is entirely based on regional certification. There are no 

procedures for either group certification or individual certification 30 . 

The regional certification process as described on the web site is in line with the 

documents of the PEFCC regarding regional certification. It is conducted in the following 

steps: 

1- Step 1: A regional certificate is issued to a regional applicant (which must be an 

organization representing forest owners within a given region such as a forest 

25 

PEFC Belgium. Operational Procedure for Forestry Certification. Monday 22 January 2001 

26 

Michel Terlinden , Boscertificatie – ervaring in het Waalse Gewest, 29 April 2002 

27 

PEFC Austria Newsletter 6/02 – December 2003 

28 

PEFC Czech Republic. http://pefc.org/contact-frame4.htm. June 2003 

29 

CFCS 1001:2002 (p5) 

30 

CFCS 1001:2001 Forest Management Certification: Certification System Description p12 

13

owners association) after a third-party audit was conducted by a certification 

body. A prerequisite for submitting the application for the regional certification is 

that the applicant represents forest owners which posses at least 50% of the area 

of all forests in the region The audit is based on a report written by the applicant 

itself on the “condition of forest management” in the region, which is evaluated 

against the CFCS standard by the certification body. The CFCS is a system-based 

standard 31 . The regional certificate is issued for a period of maximum 5 years. 

2- Step 2: Once the regional certificate has been issued to the regional applicant, 

those individual forest owners in the region who want to be part of the regional 

certification scheme must apply to the applicant. The applicant then decides 

whether or not to accept the forest owner in the regional certification scheme 

based on an analysis of information provided by forest institutions (State Forests 

Administration, Czech Inspection of the Environment, etc) on the conditions of 

forest management as well as an optional field inspection. The option of a field 

visit is left to the discretion of the regional applicant based on whether or not it is 

financially feasible. The guidelines encourage the applicant to skip the field visit 

when the source of information “guarantees sufficient measure of credibility and 

reliability” 32 . If the forest owner is considered to fulfil the certification criteria by 

the regional applicant, a “confirmation of participation” is issued to the owner 

(but the certificate remains the property of the main applicant). 

Only the combined area of those forest owners who have been accepted into the regional 

certification scheme is considered and counted as certified area. 

Refusal to a forest owner to join the regional certification is considered as a possible 

outcome of step 2 in the above process. However, it was not possible to determine if this 

has occurred or not. It is unclear how easy in practice it is for forest owners to join the 

regional certification. Forest owners can also be expelled from a regional certification if 

they are found not to comply with the certification criteria during sample monitoring field 

visits. “Conformity with criteria on the individual level is assessed periodically and can 

result in the exclusion of the owner from the regional certification” unless the forest owner 

him/herself provides “credible evidence” of removing the elements of non-conformity 33 . 

No field visits will take place to check the validity of the information provided by the 

forest owner on how she/he will remove the elements of non-conformity 34 . 

The fact that forest owners must actively submit an application to join the regional 

certification scheme implies that all owners within a certified region know whether or not 

they are certified. The CFCS documents also stress the importance for the regional 

applicant to thoroughly inform all forest owners about the regional certification and 

participation conditions. 

Other: 

31 

CFCS 1002:2001 Criteria and Indicators for Sustainable Forest Management 

32 

CFCS 1006:2000 Guidelines for Ensuring the Participation of Individual Forest Owners in Regional 

Certification p6 

33 

CFCS 1001:2001 

34 

CFCS 1006:2000 p 7 

14

Now that all state land has been CFCS certified, the Czech National Governing Body is 

planning to increase outreach to small forest owners. 

ITALY 

Name of the national PEFC Governing Body: PEFC Italy 

Endorsed by the PEFCC in: No information available 

Number of hectares certified as of April 30 2003: 0 


According to the Statutes of PEFC Italy, the board consists of 11 seats, 3 of which 

should be reserved for representatives of social and environmental interests (trade union, 

environmental group, consumers group). The rest of the seats are distributed among the 

forest industry and forest owners associations 35 . 

The seat for environmental organization has always been and remains vacant 36 . It is not 

specified how the voting rights are distributed among all representatives. 


The documentation on the web site of PEFC Italy does not detail the level at which 

certification will be carried out. It simply states that regional, group and individual 

certification are possible but neither of the respective procedures is described 37 . There are 

however two documents outlining the criteria and indicators of certification: one for 

regional certification and one for individual and group certification 38 . 

LATVIA 

Name of the national PEFC Governing Body: PEFC Latvia Council 

Endorsed by the PEFCC in: July 2001 

Number of hectares certified as of April 30 2003: 17 081 


No information about the membership of the National Governing Body. Each member of 

the National Governing Body in Latvia has 1 vote 39 . 


According to WWF Latvia, PEFC Latvia is based on regional certification. There are no 

procedures established for group certification. Latvia`s Forest Owners Association was 

PEFC certified on September 19, 2001. Forest owners who are members of the 

Association must actively require to become part of the regional certification. Only 1-2% 

35 

PEFC Italy www.pefc.it . June 2003 

36 

PEFC Italy www.pefc.it/cds.asp June 2003 

37 

PEFC Italy www.pefc.it/procedure.apc June 2003 

38 

PEFC Italy http://www.pefc.it/forum.asp June 2003 

39 

WWF Latvia. Personnal communication with Janis Rozitis, July 15, 2003 

15

of the private forest owners in Latvia belong to a forest owners association but it is 

unclear how independent forest owners can become PEFC certified at this point in time 40 . 

NORWAY 

Name of the national PEFC Governing Body: PEFC Norway 

Endorsed by the PEFCC in: May 2000 

Number of hectares certified as of April 30 2003: 9.352 000 


There are six organisations from the forest sector sitting on the board of PEFC Norway 

and no representatives from social/environmental interests. Decision making rights and 

procedures are not specified on the web site of PEFC Norway 41 . 


PEFC Norway conducts both individual and group certification. There doesn’t seem to be 

any procedures in place for regional certification. Three options exist for group 

certification: 

The Membership Scheme: The bylaws of the forest owners association state that 

the members have to meet the Living Forests Standards for SFM, independent of 

whether the association market their timber or not. 

The Agreement Scheme: Commits the forest owner to meet the Living Forests 

Standards for SFM, as well as to confirm that the forest owner wants to join a 

group (pool) to obtain certification. 

The Sales Contract Scheme: Commits the forest owner to meet the Living Forests 

Standards for SFM, if he/she wants the association to market his/her timber 42 . 

In all the cases, it is the group manager who obtains the certificate and the members only 

need to send a confirmation of participation in the group certification scheme, stipulating 

that they are committed to the criteria defined by PEFC 43 . 

Other 

According to WWF Norway, 90% of the timber harvested in Norway is PEFC certified. 

SPAIN 

Name of the national PEFC Governing Body: PEFC Spain 

Endorsed by the PEFCC in: May 2002 


40 

Ibid 

41 

PEFC Norway. http:// www.pefcnorge.org. June 2003 

42 

Ibid 

43 

Ibid 

16


According to PEFC Spain, standard development was a transparent and participatory 

process “involving more than 55 organizations, representatives of the Trade Unions, 

Professional Associations, Industrial Associations, Public and Private Research Institutes, 

Forestry Sector Companies, Consultancies, Public Bodies, Public and Private Forestry 

Owners, Universities and End Consumers, and with invitation extended to the main 

Environmental Associations”. The Committee’s Draft Standards were published for 

public consultation 44 . 

It was not possible to find out whether any Spanish environmental organizations had 

been involved in the process at one stage or another. It wasn’t possible to identify the 

composition of the board and the voting rights and procedures among board members. 


Certification can in theory be carried out either at the regional level or at the group / 

individual level. It was not possible to determine at what level certification is carried out 

in practice. 

Regional Certification requires the creation of a Regional Applicant Entity which, directly 

or through representatives, “brings together the forest managers in the region who are 

interested in the process” 45 . 

The Regional Entity is responsible for the application and is required “to establish a 

procedure to ensure that all participants comply with their obligations and provide 

technical assistance to the Certification Entity during the audit processes”. The Regional 

Entity is also required to keep a register of forest areas and the participants included in 

the regional certificate, identifying the owner, manager and the area 46 . 

Individual forest owners/managers must actively request to be part of the regional 

certification by signing a "Confirmation of Participation in a Regional Forestry 

Management Certificate" and commit to complying with the requirements set out in the 

Sustainable Forestry Management Certification System. The document will “indicate the 

number of the certificate and its term of validity, along with the information on the 

Regional Applicant Entity and the Certification Entity which issued the certificate” 47 . 

Other 

A participant in a Regional Certification may be expelled if a serious breach is observed of 

certification requirements and adequate corrective action was not taken after it was 

notified in writing. The member expelled may rejoin the group after a specified fixed 

period, if corrective action was taken. A Regional Applicant Entity has the power to 

decide on the length of the expulsion. An appeal may be brought against this decision 

with the PEFC-España Arbitration Commission. 

44 

PEFC Spain. http://www.pefc.es/eng/sistema/pefc-eng.pdf. The Spanish Certification System for 

Sustainable Forest Management, March 2002. 

45 

Ibid 

46 

Ibid 

47 

Ibid 

17

SWITZERLAND 

This is the web site of “Economie Forestiere Suisse” which is a forest owners association. 

The certification section is given as the Swiss PEFC information page by PEFCC but it 

contains only general information about certification (including FSC). 

Name of the national PEFC Governing Body: PEFC Switzerland and HWK- 

Zertifizierungsstelle 

Endorsed by the PEFCC in: October 2001 



No information available on the PEFC website 48 . According to WWF Switzerland, it is 

difficult to obtain information about decision making processes in PEFC Switzerland. The 

leading Swiss environmental or social organisations are not involved in the decision 

making processes of PEFC Switzerland and voting procedures are unclear 49 . 


PEFC Switzerland only certifies single forest managements units. Group certification is 

not possible (even though it becomes more and more common in practice according to 

WWF Switzerland). Entire regions are not certified at once and the certification process 

always entails a field visit 50 . 

UK 

Name of the national PEFC Governing Body: PEFC UK Ltd. 

Endorsed by the PEFCC in: March 2002 



The maximum number of directors is 10 and there are currently 10. It was not possible to 

determine their respective affiliations. PEFC UK requires all certification in the UK to be 

against the UK Woodland Assurance Standard. PEFC UK has five separate and equal 

categories of membership 51 : 

1. Forest and woodland owners 

2. Forest products processors, manufacturers, retailers and wholesalers 

48 

http://www.wvs.ch/fr/forest/certifi.html. June 2003 

49 

WWF Switzerland. Personnal communication with Damian Oettli, July 9, 2003 

50 

Ibid 

51 

PEFC UK http://www.pefc.co.uk. June 2003 

18

3. Suppliers of goods and services to the wood chain 

4. Environmental and social interest groups 

5. Statutory bodies 


No information available on the web site. 

19

IV. PEFC Sweden 

Author: Elisa Peter 

This text was written based on information provided by WWF Sweden, SSNC and PEFC 

Sweden (responses to the questionnaire). Literature review and an interview with the 

National Accreditation Body provided additional information. The numbered criteria refer 

to those included in the first edition of Behind the Logo. 

Summary of the main changes in PEFC Sweden since 2001 

When the first edition of Behind the Logo was published in 2001, PEFC Sweden had only 

developed a forest certification standard. There were no Chain of Custody (CoC) 

certification procedures and no accredited certifiers to carry out PEFC certification. 

During the year 2001 certification bodies were accredited and umbrella organizations 

(Forest Owners Associations and Independent Sawmills Associations) were certified. 

Several CoC certificates were delivered. 

As of 2002, all the Forest Owners Associations and the Independent Sawmills 

Associations in Sweden were PEFC certified 52 . 

The Swedish PEFC standard has been slightly modified in 2002 as a result of a 

comparative study between the Swedish PEFC and FSC standards 53 , in which WWF 

Sweden and the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation participated. The study 

showed that the Swedish PEFC standard had lower demands than the FSC standard on 17 

points, while the FSC standard had lower demands on 4 points 54 . 

The subsequent changes in the PEFC standard concern the logging moratorium for key 

biotopes (in which forest owners must restrain from logging key biotopes on their 

property until 2005, after which the key biotope protection will be conditional of State 

compensation), environmental evaluation routines and requirement for set aside areas in 

the Northern region (increased from 3% to 5%). The changes were endorsed by the PEFC 

Council in April 2002 55 . 

52 

PEFC Sweden. http://www.pefc.se June 2003. Original with the author. 

53 

Aulén, G. and Bleckert, S. 2002. Skogsduvan – Förslag till överbyggnadsdokument mellan svenska 

PEFC och FSC standarder. 

54 

Lena Dahl, WWF Sweden. Response to PEFC questionnaire. June 18, 2003. 

55 

Folke Stenström, Executive Director PEFC Sweden. Response to the PEFC questionnaire. June 23, 

2003 

20

Swedish PEFC – certification status 

Certified forest area Number of Number of participating forest 

(ha) 

certificates owners 

Regional 

certification 

0 0 0 

Group 

certification 

2 258 974 9 17 609 

Individual 

certification 

0 0 0 

Total 2 258 974 9 17 609 

Source: PEFCC Information register 

http://www.pefc.cz/register/STATISTICS1.ASP?COUNTRY=Sweden&COUNTRY_CODE=05 

July 16, 2003 

Criteria II: Equal and balanced participation of a broad range of stakeholders 

The level of participation of various interested parties in PEFC has remained unchanged 

in Sweden. Although membership is open to a broad range of organizations, private forest 

owners and forest owners associations still make up most of the members. 

There are seats on the National Governing Body reserved for NGOs but they remain 

vacant 56 . 

The members are divided into three groups representing “forestry”, “primary wood 

processing industry” and “other interests”. The voting power of each group is capped to 

ensure that the maximum number of votes for each group is restricted to seven. This 

structure hasn’t changed since 2001 and implies that two third of the voting power of the 

General Assembly rests with forest owners and the wood processing industry (Lindahl, 

K. 2001). 

Criteria III: A labelling system, including a credible chain of custody 

The “Vägledningsgokument “ of PEFC Sweden includes mechanisms for chain of custody 

certification and labelling (PEFC Sweden, 2003). 

The document on CoC certification was amended and a new version published by PEFC 

Sweden on March 17, 2003 as required by the PEFCC to reflect the new CoC policy of 

the PEFCC as described in Annex 4 of the Technical Document 57 . According to WWF 

Sweden, the revised version doesn’t include any substantial changes. 

56 

Lena Dahl, WWF Sweden. Response to PEFC questionnaire. June 18, 2003 

57 


2003 

21

A new standard for group-certification of CoC has been developed and was sent to the 

PEFC Council for endorsement the last week of June 2003 58 . 

The two basic approaches to CoC certification which were in place in 2001 have remained 

virtually unchanged and are described in the Vägledningsdokument, namely: 

- process certification of routines that are not part of a management system covered by an 

ISO certificate 

- certification of the wood-handling organization’s management system according to ISO 

9001/ISO 14001 in which routines for CoC certification are included (PEFC Sweden, 

2003) 

Organizations with valid CoC certificates are also required to apply an official policy 

under which the company can not accept wood deliveries from “controversial sources”. 

Such sources are wood from illegal logging operations or wood from key habitats, as 

defined by the PEFC policy on key biotopes (Lindahl, K. 2001) 

The rules for chain of custody and use of label in the Swedish PEFC are based on Annex 4 

of the PEFFC, namely inventory control and accounting of wood flows (the input/output 

system (%in/%out) and minimum average percentage system) and physical separation 

(PEFC Sweden, 2003). 

All five of the Forest Owners Associations have CoC certification. Among the 

Independent Sawmills Association, PanCert (Southern Sweden) can issue CoC certificates 

to its members while Prosilva (Northern Sweden) only has CoC certificates for its own 

operations. The third Sawmill Association, in Central Sweden, requires that its members 

have their own CoC certificates (Dahl, L. 2002). 

Criteria IV: Independent third-party assessments, adequate control mechanisms 

and stakeholder consultation 

Certification bodies accredited by the National Swedish Accreditation Body – the 

Swedish Board for Accreditation and Conformity Assessment (SWEDAC) – are the only 

organizations certifying forests under the Swedish PEFC scheme. Since 2001, four 

certification bodies have been accredited by SWEDAC to carry out PEFC certification 59 : 

- Det Norske Veritas (DNV) 

- SEMKO-DEKRA Certification 

- Sveriges Provnings- och Forskningsinstitut (SP) 

- Bureau Veritas Quality International 

SGS Sweden has also carried out PEFC certification in Sweden, although SGS Sweden is 

not accredited by SWEDAC. However SGS Germany was accredited in Germany to 

conduct PEFC certification and any certification body that has been accredited in one of 

58 Ibid 

59 Kent Gustavsson, SWEDAC. Personal communication June 16, 2003 

22

the PEFC member countries is allowed to conduct PEFC certification in any other of the 

countries where PEFC has members (Dahl, L. 2002). 

The certifiers follow the PEFCC requirements for certifiers set out in Annex 6 of the 

Technical Document 60 . 

The certification process entails field visits but stakeholder consultation during the 

certification process is not required 61 . 

Certificates are regularly revisited, though the frequency of the monitoring audits varies 

from certifier to certifier between every 6 to 12 months (Dahl, L. 2002). 

Monitoring audits consists of a desk review of the forest management plan as well as field 

visits to control all aspects of the standard. The certification bodies have developed their 

own sampling methods for monitoring, which differ from one another. For example SGS 

Sweden AB considers that the scope of the sampling depends on the quality of the 

umbrella organization’s internal audit and has visited 20 forest owners during their last 

audit of the Southern Forest Owners Association, Södra, which counts 10 000 

members 62 . On the other hand, Det Norske Veritas had visited all the forest owners 

within the Northern Independent Sawmill Association (Prosilva) (Dahl, L. 2002). 

As regards to group certification, the umbrella organizations are required to carry out 

regular internal monitoring audits of their members. The monitoring procedures for group 

certification include field visits 63 . Internal audit of only 5% of the members of a group 

certification scheme is required if the umbrella organization has more than 1000 members, 

which is the case for most of the Forest Owners Associations in Sweden (Dahl, L. 2002). 

Only two associations carried out field visits in 2001 – Södra visited 2,5 % and Vastra 9 

% 64 . 

Criteria V: Full transparency to all concerned parties and the public 

According to WWF Sweden transparency within the Swedish PEFC system is 

“essentially non-existent” (Dahl, L. 2002). The main shortcomings identified by WWF 

Sweden are: 

1- Consultation of interested parties is not required during the certification process in 

the Swedish PEFC. 

2- Public registers of the forest owners that are members of an umbrella organization 

are not publicly available. 

3- Certification or audit reports are not publicly available. 

60 

PEFCC. Annex 6: Certification and Accreditation Procedures, available at http://www.pefc.org . June 

2003. Original with the author. 

61 


2003 

62 

Comment from Jan-Åke Lundén in the magazine Miljörapporten May 16, 2002 

63 

PEFC Sweden. Vägledningsdokument för paraplyorganisationer 

64 


23

Because registers are not publicly available, it is difficult for external parties to find out 

which forest owners are PEFC certified, which in turn makes it hard if not impossible for 

external parties to monitor the certification process and outcomes and hinders the 

possibilities of bringing forward a complaint 65 . 

However, web publication of summary reports will become mandatory in Sweden as of 

January 1, 2004. The certification body will be responsible for the publication of the 

summary report 66 . 

Criteria VI: Certification at the forest management unit level, rather than at 

country or regional level 

The Swedish PEFC scheme operates solely at the Forest Management Unit (FMU) level, 

either through individual or group certification. 

There is no regional certification in Sweden. This implies that a certification contract is 

signed with every individual forest owner within an umbrella group (such as a Forest 

Owners Association) and directly with larger owners outside an umbrella group, which 

are then audited directly by a certifier (PEFC Sweden Technical document 2002). 

Criteria VII: Cost effectiveness and voluntary nature 

There is no fixed cost / hectare for PEFC certification that the forest owner is charged. 

Costs for forest-certification and auditing are usually subsidized by the forest owners 

association while costs for chain of custody are covered by the enterprise which applies 

for it 67 . 

Criteria VIII: Commitments from the forest owner/manager to improving forest 

management 

According to WWF Sweden, the main incentive for forest owners to become PEFC 

certified is that that can get more money for PEFC certified than uncertified timber, and 

that the certification is sponsored by the forest owners associations 68 . According to 

PEFC the main advantage of PEFC certification for forest owners is a better access to the 

market and – in some cases - a price premium 69 . 

65 

Per Larsson, WWF Sweden. Personal conversation July 6, 2003. 

66 


2003 

67 

Ibid 

68 


69 


2003 

24

According to PEFC Sweden, the PEFC standard requires changes to existing forest 

practices. For instance, the forest owners seeking PEFC certification need to establish a 

“green management plan”. However many forest owners already have such a management 

plan even if they are not PEFC certified 70 . 

Forest Owners Associations can decide to suspend a forest owner from the certification 

in case of non-compliance. PEFC Sweden didn’t know if this had occurred since the 

procedure t exclude a forest owner is entirely handled by the Forest Owners Associations 

or other umbrella organizations. 

Criteria IX: Applicability to all forest sizes and tenure systems 

The Swedish PEFC scheme has been intended to fit all kinds of forests and land tenure 

existing in Sweden. The primary target group of the scheme is small private forest owners 

but the PEFC system is also open for “direct certification” of large owners and 

entrepreneurs. (Lindahl K., 2001). 

The majority of PEFC certified forestland is privately owned 71 but around 40 

municipalities are also PEFC certified 72 . 

The majority of the PEFC certified forest holdings are around 50 hectares 73 . If Holmen 

Skog becomes PEFC certified (they plan to go through the certification process at the end 

of 2003) they would become the largest PEFC certified holding in Sweden with 1 million 

hectares 74 . 

Criteria X: An effective and transparent complaints procedure 

The responsibility for conflict resolution is described in the PEFC Sweden Technical 

document (chapter 7) and is divided between PEFC Sweden, the certification bodies and 

the national accreditation body. 

The Technical Document briefly explains how to deal with complaints addressed to 

PEFC Sweden but it does not include information on how complaints to Forest Owners 

Associations should be handled. According to PEFC Sweden all the Forest Owners 

Associations have routines to handle external complaints 75 . Although anyone is allowed 

to bring forward a complaint, no formal complaints have so far been brought to the 

board 76 . 

70 

Per Larsson, WWF Sweden. Personal communication July 6, 2003 

71 

Ibid 

72 


73 


2003 

74 

Ibid 

75 

Ibid 

76 

Ibid 

25

SWEDAC has its own regulations to handle complaints regarding the accreditation 

procedure and outcome and requires from the certification bodies it accredits that they 

have their own procedures for addressing complaints regarding the certification process 

and outcome. No complaints have been brought forward to SWEDAC as regards to the 

accreditation of PEFC certification bodies 77 . 

Criteria XII: A transparent and high quality accreditation procedure 

Accreditation of PEFC certifiers has been fully operational in Sweden since 2001. The 

certification bodies are accredited by the National Accreditation Body SWEDAC. 

The first step in the accreditation process involves an assessment by SWEDAC of the 

competence of the organization that has applied for accreditation based on an assessment 

of the applicant’s documentation that describes its quality system, working and 

administrative procedures and the competence of its personnel 78 . 

The second step includes verification of how work is actually performed in practice 

through an assessment “on site” to check whether the normative documents are being 

correctly interpreted and applied in day to day work. SWEDAC also participates as an 

observer in one or more certification audits in the field before the final accreditation 

decision is taken. The assessment is documented in a report, which is not public 79 . 

Assessments are conducted by a lead assessor together with a technical expert from 

SkogsForsk, who is contracted on an ad-hoc basis to conduct accreditation and 

surveillance visits of PEFC accreditation bodies 80 . SkogForsk is “the research institute of 

the Swedish forestry sector” 81 . 

Assessment is performed against the requirements set out in SWEDAC’s various 

accreditation regulations (STAFS) and the international standards with requirements on 

certification bodies and certification. The basis for the accreditation process is found in 

ISO guide 61 (= EN 45010). The basis for the certification process is found in ISO guide 

65 (= EN 45011), 62 and 66 (= EN 45012) (quality and environmental systems). The 

specific requirements on forest certification and chain of custody are in the PEFC’s 

Technical Document 82 . 

Based on those documents, the certification bodies write their routines and procedures. In 

SWEDAC’s experience, the general routines of the certification bodies are usually 

sufficient to deal with the general parts of the certification. The certification bodies need 

to add some special routines in order to meet the specific requirements such as those of 

the PEFC. SWEDAC in cooperation with PEFC Sweden and the certification bodies have 

developed a guiding document called “Certifieringsbeslut och certifikat” for certification 

77 

Kent Gustavsson, SWEDAC. Personal communication June 16, 2003 

78 

SWEDAC. http://www.swedac.se/sdd/System.nsf/(GUIview)/index_eng.html. June 2003 . Original with 

the author 

79 


80 

Ibid 

81 

SkogForsk www.skogforsk.se . Original with the author. 

82 


26

odies conducting certification against the PEFC standard (PEFC Sweden, 2003). It is 2 

pages long and includes guidance to the certification bodies on how to interpret the PEFC 

standard. 

Accreditation decisions for accredited certification bodies are always monitored by regular 

surveillance visits, normally once a year, which include both a review of internal 

documentation as well as field visits. All the PEFC certification bodies have already been 

monitored once as regards to their office and administrative procedures and field visits 

will take place this year. Surveillance visits revealed only minor bureaucratic noncompliances 

which were rectified 83 . 

Anyone can bring forward a complaint to SWEDAC, which either handles it directly (if 

the complaint concerns the accreditation outcome) or passes it onto the certification 

body, which is required by SWEDAC to address the complaint. In case of complaints 

concerning the PEFC standard, the complaint is passed onto PEFC Sweden. No 

complaints have been filed to SWEDAC so far 84 . 

If major non-compliances are found or if it is brought to SWEDAC’s notice in some other 

way that the organization is no longer fulfilling the requirements for accreditation, 

SWEDAC can withdraw its accreditation or restrict its application. A full reassessment is 

normally performed every fourth year, carried out in the same way was the first time 

assessment 85 . 

83 Ibid 

84 Ibid 

85 SWEDAC http://www.sedac.se June 2003. Original with the author 

27

VI PEFC Finland 

This section will be added to the report in mid March. 

28

PEFC France 

Information gathered by Emmanuelle Neyroumande, WWF France 

Edited by Elisa Peter 

The document was sent to France Nature Environment for their comments and these 

comments were integrated into the text. PEFC France did not respond to the questionnaire 

although they promised they would do it (they were reminded at least 5 times). 

Summary of the main changes in PEFC France since 2001 

When the first edition of Behind the Logo was published, no forests had been PEFC 

certified in France yet. As of today, France has more than 2 million hectares of PEFC 

certified forests. Regional PEFC standards are being developed at the regional level based 

on the French national PEFC standard. Regional standards have already been developed in 

14 regions (out of 22) 86 and the regional standard development processes in the remaining 

8 regions have been initiated. The decision-making procedures, structures and 

participation levels of various interests in the regional PEFC standards are the same as at 

the national level (see point 2). According to WWF France, this includes an underrepresentation 

of environmental interests. 

France Nature Environnement (FNE), a large environmental NGO which participated in 

the national PEFC standard development process, is also involved in all the regional 

processes (except in the Burgundy region where the local FNE representative had to 

withdraw his participation because of lack of resources). More than 25 local FNE member 

groups have participated in regional PEFC processes. According to FNE, regional 

consumers chambers differ from the national chamber in that they represent a greater 

diversity of interests and often have more than one ENGO representative, thereby 

increasing the influence of environmental interests in decision making process 87 . 

PEFC France – status of certification 


(ha) 


Regional 

certification 

2 005 232 14 4 664 

Group 

certification 

87 283 1 979 

Individual 

certification 

0 0 0 

Total 2 092 515 15 5 643 

Source : PEFCC Information Register 

http://www.pefc.cz/register/STATISTICS1.ASP?COUNTRY=FRANCE&COUNTRY_CODE= 

10 - July 16, 2003 

86 France Nature Environnement – personal communication with Cecile Gravier, July 17, 2003 

87 Ibid. 

29


The composition of the national governing body remains virtually unchanged. There is 

one environmental NGO participating: France Nature Environnement (FNE). 

The members at the national and regional levels are divided into three chambers: 

producers, industry, consumers. Each chamber has one third of the votes. A decision is 

taken when there is simple majority in each one of the three chambers. 

WWF France claims that since FNE is the only member in the consumer chamber which 

represents environmental interests (others represent hunters, farmers and hikers 

associations), its decision making power is very limited. According to WWF France, the 

regional decision making structure is similar to that at the national level, thus preventing 

the NGOs to have any meaningful participation since environmental interests never 

represent more than 50% of one given chamber. 88 However FNE believes it is able to 

significantly influence the decisions, if only because one of the two the vice presidents of 

PEFC France is a FNE representative. FNE reports that many of the local representatives 

are satisfied with the level of their participation in the regional PEFC processes 89 . 


The French national accreditation body COFRAC will not recognize CoC certification as 

a certification procedure for either FSC or PEFC. CoC certification will be thus called an 

“inspection” and certifiers assessing CoC will not have to be accredited. 

The French PEFC procedure for CoC certification is being revised to reflect the updated 

PEFCC policy documents but the basic methods for CoC verification are expected to 

remain unchanged (minimum percentage threshold, input/output, physical separation). 



The French national accreditation body COFRAC does not have any specific system in 

place for accreditation of certification bodies for PEFC certification. Any certification 

body accredited by COFRAC for ISO 45012 can become a certifier for PEFC. In order to 

be accredited, the certification bodies must meet the EN 45011 and EN 45012 demands 90 . 

According to WWF France, there are no specific requirements either from COFRAC or 

from PEFC as regards to the knowledge, experience and competence of the certification 

body on forest management and environmental issues, other than for the general PEFCC 

requirements for certification bodies. 

88 PEFC France. Press release 15 March 2002 

89 France Nature Environnement – personal communication with Cecile Gravier, June 17, 2003 

90 http://www.pefc-france.org/organisation.asp?art=1565. July 2003 

30

Field visits are not mandatory before a forest is certified and nor is public consultation of 

interested parties during the certification process or monitoring audits. Only the PEFC 

members have to be consulted. 

External monitoring audits are carried out every year for the regional forest institutions 

(public and private) by certification bodies that must be accredited by the national 

organisation COFRAC. This involves a desk review of the ISO certification and of 

progress indicators. In some regions, field visits will also be carried out at that stage by 

the certification body. 

Random internal audits with field visits will also be carried out every year by the regional 

entity to check compliance of the participants of the regional certification. A forest 

owner/manager can be expelled from the regional certification in case of non-compliance 

and if corrective action is not implemented. So far, no participant of a regional 

certification has been expelled. 

The percentage of forest owners/managers who are visited on the field visits for the 

monitoring audits is left to the discretion of each regional entity, depending on the 

available budget. It is 1% in the region Centre and 5% in the region Rhone-Alpes 91 . 


Requirements as regards to public disclosure of audit reports are left to the discretion of 

the regional entities. 

Neither full audit reports nor summaries are readily available to interested parties. 

Reports were requested by WWF France from the regional PEFC in Normandy which 

never sent the documents 92 . 



PEFC France is mostly based on regional certification. However, if no regional 

certification standard is in place, individual or group certification is possible, based on the 

national standard (one group certificate has been issued outside a regional certification 

scheme but no individual certificate). 

The first step in the regional certification process is the verification by the certification 

body that the regional standard is in line with the national PEFC guidelines, minimum 

requirements, and procedures. 

91 Emmanuelle Neyroumande. WWF France. Personal communication. July 7, 2003 

92 Ibid 

31

The second step is the verification of the ISO certification of the regional branch of the 

National Forest Office (ONF, which manages all public forests) and the Private Forest 

Regional Center (CRPF, which trains forest owners and validates their management 

plans). 

Once these two forest institutions have gone through the external audit and received a 

PEFC certificate, all forests in that region become automatically “certifiable”. In order for 

private forest owners to become part of the regional certification program, an agreement 

to follow PEFC’s minimum requirements and rules on the use of the logo is signed 

between the owner and the regional entity. The agreement is a one page letter and the 

minimum requirements are usually around ten points, which include some performance 

requirement (such as no plantation on peat bog, no chemicals cans left in the forest…) and 

process requirements (such as trainings). As regards to public forests, they are all certified 

as long as the ONF in that region has received a certificate during the second step of the 

process. 

The forest institutions (ONF and CRPF) are required to have ISO certification before 

they can get certified by PEFC. However, to date, PEFC France has accepted to certify 

for two years the forest institutions who are not yet ISO certified (none are ISO certified 

yet but have committed to start the process to get ISO certification). 

Forest institutions in 11 regions are PEFC-certified, which in turn means that all the 

forests in these regions are certifiable. As of July 16, 5643 private forest owners were 

PEFC certified (which means they have signed an agreement with the regional entity). 

WWF France estimates that more than 50% of all State forest are PEFC certified. In the 

Burgundy region, all the State forests have already been PEFC certified. 


Costs vary from region to region. In Burgundy for example, certification costs are 11 

euros under 4 ha, and 11 euros plus 0.11 euros/ha/annum for properties above 4 ha 93 . 

Costs are estimated to vary between 0.10 to 0.20 euros per hectare, depending on the 

subsidies the regional PEFC manages to get. WWF France estimates that 50% of the 

certification costs are subsidized, in particular by regional councils. 

In case of group certification, forest owners are required to sign an engagement letter if 

they want to participate in the group certification. In case of regional certification, only 

forest owners signing an engagement are certified. Only participating forest owners are 

considered certified. 

93 PEFC France. Press release 15 March 2002 

32


management 

Requirements to improve forest management exist, but the level vary from region to 

region. PEFC in the “Centre” region has for example minimum requirement (endorsed on 

25 February 2002) spelling out points which would lead to the loss of a certificate : 

� To be condemn for illegal activities linked to the forestry activity 

� No management plan or equivalent or not renewed in time 

� Refused field control by the certifier or PEFC-Centre 

� Did not verify that the logging company or logger were committed to the 

specifications defined by PEFC-Centre 

� Did not impose the use of the specifications to the logger. 

� Did not inform the logging company or the logger, if relevant, about the areas 

protected by law and the specific forest management linked to them. 

� Used in artificial regeneration (except for trial spot of less than 5 ha) seeds or trees not 

coming from advised location or genetically modified. 

� Retrieved humus from the forest. 

� Knowingly destroyed or participated in the destruction of peat bog, by extraction of 

peat or drainage. 

According to WWF, as in most regions, the minimum requirements thus do not make a 

significant difference with traditional forestry. 

A forest owner can loose a certificate for non-compliance with the minimum requirements 

he or she committed to when signing the agreement with the regional entity. If a field audit 

shows non compliance, the manager has a delay to correct his action and is excluded if 

corrective action is not implemented. This hasn’t happened yet. 


In France, the share of PEFC certified public forests is larger than the share of private 

forests: 

PEFC certified State forest =1 082 002 ha 

PEFC certified municipal forest = 208 660 ha 

PEFC certified private forest owners = 741 542 ha 

Group certification = 87 261 ha 94 


The complaint mechanism is entirely based on the PEFCC documents. Only PEFC 

members can bring forward a formal complain to the certifier or PEFC. No complaints 

have been filled. 

94 

France Nature Environment – personal communication between Elisa Peter and Cecile Gravier. July 18, 

2003 

33


As stated above, there is no specific accreditation procedure for accrediting certification 

bodies certifying against the PEFC standard. The only requirement is that PEFC 

certification bodies must be accredited by COFRAC to conduct general certification (ISO 

45012). According to WWF France, COFRAC does not have forest-specific competence 

and nor does it have competence on social and environmental issues. COFRAC only 

requires from the certification bodies that they have a mechanism in place to handle 

complaints regarding ISO certification (nothing about forest and/or PEFC certification). 

As of July 16 four certification bodies were accredited to conduct PEFC certification 95 : 

- Bureau Veritas Quality International (BVQI) 

- ECOPASS 

- AFAQ 

- DNV 

Four other bodies were conducting CoC certification (called « verifiers », and not 

accredited by the COFRAC) 96 : 

- BVQI France 

- SGS 

- CTBA (Centre technique du bois et de l’ameublement) 

- CTBI (Centre technique de l’industrie du bois) 

95 PEFC France. http://www.pefc-france.org/organisation.asp?art=1810 July 16, 2003 

96 Ibid 

34

PEFC Germany 

Information gathered by Rudolf Fenner, Robin Wood. 

Text edited by Elisa Peter. 

The answers to the questionnaire from PEFC Germany were integrated into the document 

where indicated by the notes. 

Summary of the main changes in PEFC Germany since 2001 

Although a revision of the standard is scheduled for 2005, the glossary for the national 

standard has been slightly modified to make some definitions clearer (Annex IV of the 

standard) 97 . 

At least two of the more detailed definitions in the glossary of the German standard 

(Annex IV of the system description) which were made on January 16, 2003, are worth 

mentioning because they are mentioned in the German case study (table 1) of Behind the 

logo: 

1. Table 1 – Use of Fertilizers 

In 2001, it appeared that the use of fertilizers in Christmas tree plantations was allowed 

in the PEFC standard. Today, the standard explicitly excludes Christmas tree plantations 

or ornamental twigs plantations. Products from those areas are not allowed to be labeled 

with the PEFC logo. This means that cuttings can take place and fertilizers and pesticides 

can be used on these forest areas, but that the products (Christmas trees, etc.) can not be 

sold as PEFC-certified products. In the German FSC-system Christmas tree plantations 

are not excluded from certification; pesticides, fertilizers are not allowed. 

2. Table 1 – Pesticide Use 

Neither “expert advice” nor “last resort” were terms which were defined in the PEFC 

standard as regards to the use of biocides in forest management. They are now more 

defined: the certification expert must have a higher degree in forestry; he/she must give 

his/her advice in a written form and he/she must state, that all other alternative biological 

methods were tried and that there is no heavy risk for the forest stand. 

It is also worth noting that summary assessment reports are now available on the web site 

of PEFC Germany. Although NGOs claim that the reports only include general 

information, it is one of the few instances where assessment reports are made publicly 

available on a PEFC web site. 

97 

PEFC Germany www.pefc.de/system/leitlinien.htm , June 2003 

35

PEFC Germany – status of certification 


(ha) 


Regional 

certification 

6 470 873 11 5 259 

Group 

certification 

0 0 0 

Individual 

certification 

0 0 0 

Total 6 470 873 11 5 259 

Source : PEFCC Information register 

http://www.pefc.cz/register/STATISTICS1.ASP?COUNTRY=Germany&COUNTRY_CODE=04 

July 16, 2003 


There has been no formal changes in the composition of the German Forest certification 

Council, the German PEFC body, since 2001 except that one of the seats for trade unions 

has become empty since the IG BAU (Industriegewerkschaft Bauen Agrar Umwelt) left 

the Council. The 18 seats are distributed as follows 98 : 

- 9 for the forest owners (4 private, 3 state, 2 municipal) 

- 1 timber trade organisation 

- 1 saw mill 

- 1 paper industry 

- 1 contractor 

- 2 seats for unions, but only one is filled by a forester organisation 

- 2 seats for environmental organisations 

- 1 consumer protection seat, which is not filled yet 

Voting rights are distributed equally among all seats and decisions are taken by simple 

majority. In case of parity of votes, the chair of the board who, in accordance with the 

statutes, must be a representative of the forest owners, casts the decisive vote 99 . 


CoC certificates are now issued according to the new guidelines described in the PEFCC 

CoC procedures adopted in November 2002 100 . An accredited certification body assesses 

compliance with the PEFCC CoC requirements and issues a CoC certificate if those 

requirements are fulfilled. 

98 

PEFC Germany www.pefc.ihb.de/in_kuerze/mitglieder.htm , June 2003 

99 

Fenner, R and Kill, J. German case study for Behind the logo. Fern, 2001 

100 

PEFC Germany http://www.pefc.de/produktkette/herkunft.htm , June 2003 

36



Certification bodies accredited by the national accreditation body (Traegergemeinschaft 

fuer Akkreditierung, TGA) in accordance with EN 45011 and/or EN 45012 are entitled to 

carry out PEFC certification. A further requirement for PEFC certification bodies is 

accreditation by TGA in Scope No 1 “Environment and Quality Management” 

(Agriculture, Forestry, Fisheries) 101 . 

The following certifiers are carrying out PEFC certification: 

- Landesgewerbeanstalt (Intercert/LGA) 

- Gesellschaft fur Qualitaetsmanagement system (DQS) 

- TUEV in German: TÜV Nord Zertifizierungs- und Umweltgutachter Gesellschaft 

(TUEV Nord) 

- AGRIZERT 

- SGS-ICS 

Requirements and procedures are described in detail in the system description and in 

Annex V: Area weighted control-sampling. 

The certification process hasn’t changed. The certification body assesses the regional 

forest report which was written by the regional PEFC working group. The report is based 

on existing forest-related data and addresses the requirements described in the List of 

Indicators for Sustainable Forest Management at the regional level (Annex II of the PEFC 

Germany systems document). If the regional forest report passes the certification audit, 

the audited region receives a “certificate of conformity” 102 . Private forest owners must 

then apply to get a certificate. 

No field visits are required for regions to receive a declaration of conformity, or for a 

forest owner to receive a certificate. 

The auditing process hasn’t changed either. Every five years, the regional forest report is 

re-assessed by the certification body. During these assessments, the certification body 

determines the extent to which the goals set out in the regional forest report have been 

achieved. If the regional forest report does not pass the re-assessment, all certificates in 

the region become invalid. Thus, a forest owner could loose his / her certificate even 

though forest management of their forests may be in compliance with all PEFC 

performance requirements they pledged to comply with 103 . 

Annual field visits assessing forest management at the level of the forest management unit 

are carried out according to an area-weighted sampling system by the regional entity. State 

and larger municipal forests as well as larger private forest holdings are more likely to be 

101 Fenner, R and Kill, J. German case study for Behind the logo. Fern, 2001 


103 Ibid 

37

assessed during field visits then smaller holdings with this sampling method. Annex V of 

the PEFC systems documents requires that 10% of certified forests be audited annually. 

A process that would ensure that during the lifetime of a certificate all certificate holders 

in the certified regions have been subject to at least one field visit does not appear to be in 

place 104 . 

Consultation of interested parties during the certification process or during monitoring 

audits is not required. Although, according to PEFC Germany, all interested parties have 

the possibility to join the regional working groups and would then be fully informed and 

integrated in the planning and implementation of the field audits. They have the 

opportunity to accompany the certifiers as witnesses. PEFC Germany states that even 

those groups which have refused to join these working groups are invited to field audits. 


The PEFC documents suggest that a summary of the audit report be made public. The 

certifier makes the final decision on the content of the (summary) report. 

Summary reports, or “excerpts” as they are called, are publicly available on the web site 

of PEFC Germany 105 . These reports are generally around 10 to 20 pages and contain 

information such as the size of the certified area and the type of forest ownership. There 

is no information about which forest owner was audited and what the results of the 

certification was in that specific forest. 



PEFC Germany still operates at a regional level. There are no procedures in place for 

individual or group certification. A regional report is produced by PEFC regional working 

groups with the support of state forestry departments. The report largely contains 

inventory data gathered for other national and regional reporting purposes, they do not 

contain information related to quantified and binding performance requirements pertaining 

to forest management on-the-ground 106 . 

Following a successful audit of a regional report, a declaration of conformity is issued at 

the regional level and the forests in the region become certifiable. The forest owners in the 

region receive a certificate indicating they practise sustainable forest management by 

committing voluntarily to the forest management guidelines (‘Leitlinien’) developed by 

PEFC-Germany. These guidelines are considered by PEFC Germany as performancebased; 

the analysis carried out for this report however, revealed a lack of definitions for 

104 Ibid 

105 PEFC Germany http://www.pefc.de , June 2003 


38

crucial terms, ambiguous wording on several key issues and a number of possible 

exceptions from performance requirements spelled out in the guidelines 107 . 

There are now 10 regions which have received their PEFC “declaration of conformity”, 

i.e. for which regional report have been accepted by a certifier. This basically means that 

those regions are certifiable (up from 6 regions when the first edition of Behind the Logo 

was published). Three more regions are in the process of getting their declaration of 

conformity which will bring the total number of PEFC-certified regions to thirteen. 


The certification costs for the forest owners (assessment and issuance of a certificate) are 

fixed by PEFC Germany at 11 euros (basic fee) + 0,11 euros per ha / year 108 . Single 

forest owners who do not belong to a forest owners association and who own less than 5 

hectares only pay the basic fee of 11 euros. The costs for CoC certification are not set 

and are decided by the certifiers themselves 109 


management 

A forest owner can theoretically loose a certificate for non-compliance but this hasn’t 

happened yet. 


As of April 2003, there were 6,3 million of PEFC certified forests in Germany 110 . 

PEFC certified forest land constitutes of: 

- 3 million ha of state owned forest (47% of all PEFC certified- forests) 

- 1,6 million ha of municipal forest (16,6 % of all PEFC certified forests) 

- 1,73 million ha of forestry associations/co-operatives forests (mainly private) 

(27%) 

- 0,60 million ha of privately owned forests (9,4% of PEFC certified forests) 

According to PEFC Germany the smallest PEFC certified area is 1 ha and the largest 73 

7689 ha 111 . 


107 

Ibid 

108 

D. Teegelbekkers, PEFC Germany. Response to the questionnaire July 2003. 

109 

Ibid 

110 

PEFC Germany Newsletter April 15, 2003 

111 

D. Teegelbekkers, PEFC Germany. Response to the questionnaire July 2003. 

39

The complaints mechanism is based on general PEFCC policy documents. PEFC 

Germany does not provide for a specific dispute resolution mechanism. Depending on the 

nature of the complaint, resolution of the appeal is sought with the representative of the 

regional working group, the regional working group itself or eventually by tabling a 

request for a special audit at the level of the forest management unit concerned by the 

complaint. There appears to be no independent dispute resolution body within the 

structure of PEFC Germany representing different stakeholder interests to address 

complaints 112 . 

There is one example of a complaint being brought forward by an NGO in Germany. 

NABU brought forward a complaint regarding the PEFC certification of the forests of a 

small city (Wertheim) in the Baden-Württemberg region. The city had planned a 30 ha 

clearcut in its PEFC-certified forest and cut 13 ha in April 2001, the rest (17 ha) – 

planned for 2003 and 2005 – will not happen because of protests by NABU and 

intervention of the PEFC certifier. The auditor stated that this clearcut is not in line with 

the PEFC-standard ,and will withdraw the certificate if the municipality does not 

implement the corrective actions 113 . 


No changes here either. Certification bodies must be accredited by the national 

accreditation body, TGA. Although TGA carries out annual audits of certification bodies 

carrying out PEFC certification, the agency is not assessing if a certification body fulfils 

any specific requirements needed to carry out PEFC audits. Thus a certifier’s 

performance with regards to PEFC requirements is not evaluated by the accreditation 

agency or anybody else 114 . 

Comparison PEFC and FSC in Germany 

Forestry Practice FSC PEFC 

Set aside areas 5% in public forests larger than 1.000 no set aside areas 

ha 

115 

Protection of Rare numerous regulations for the Temporarily but not 

species and forests protection of species, biotopes and permanently protected 

forests 

“specific consideration” for 

protected species; no 

regulations for rare forests 


113 PEFC Germany Newsletter 15 ( http://pefc.ihb.de/aktuelles/dateienshow.php?id=286 ) 


115 For forest owners associations, the issue of set-aside areas was one of the key areas of criticism against 

the FSC standard even though the FSC Germany standard exempts all private forest owners and all 

municipal forest holdings smaller then 1000 ha from the requirements to set aside areas. 

40

Retention of 

eternity trees 

up to 10 cavity trees per hectare in 

addition to a strategy to maintain or 

increase the amount of snags and logs 

“in an appropriate/reasonable 

amount” 

Use of fertilisers not allowed not allowed, but the proposed 

consequences in case of noncompliance 

is information to 

raise awareness of the 

certificate holder 

Use of chemicals The use of biocides in forest Treatment of timber with 

management is not allowed. The only biocides is allowed without 

exception is granted in cases, where restrictions 

public notice by authorities demands The use of biocides in forest 

the use of biocides; no labelling of management is allowed only as 

timber with the FSC-Logo for six a last resort and after expert 

months after the treatment with advice; 

biocides; 

Expert could be any forester 

the treatment of timber with biocides with a high school or university 

is not allowed. 

degree. 

Stand composition 

and structure 

see German case study 2001 see German case study 2001 

Clearcutting see German case study 2001 see German case study 2001 

Hunting must assure, that the natural must assure that the natural 

regeneration of all site specific tree regeneration of the main site 

species must be possible without any adapted tree species must be 

technical aids (e.g. fences) 

possible without any technical 

aid and only “within the 

bounds of the possibilities of 

the forest owner” 

41

Annex 1 – List of PEFC members 

(from www.pefc.org) 

As of April 30, 2003 

42

MEMBERS OF PEFCC 

COUNTRY 

NAME OF NATIONAL PEFC GOVERNING BODY 

ADDRESS 

SECRETARY 

Australia 

NAFI (on behalf of AFS) 

AFS Project Office 

c/o GPO Box 858 

Canberra ACT 2601 

Australia 

Tel: +61 (02) 6272 4129 

Fax: +61 (02) 6272 4875 

Email: afs@forestrystandard.org.au 

Mr Mark Edwards 

Austria 

PEFC Austria 

Alser Strasse 21/1/5 

A-1080 Wien, 

Austria 

Tel: +43 1 402 4701 17 

Fax: +43 1 40 113 50 

E-mail: info@pefc.at 

Web-site: www.pefc.at 

Mr Dietmar Hagauer 

Belgium 

WoodNet asbl 

Galerie du Centre, Bloc 2 

1000 Bruxelles, 

Belgique 

Tel: +32 2 223 4421 

Fax: +32 2 223 4275 

E-mail: Woodnet@skynet.be 

Web-site: www.woodnet.com 

Mr Bertrand Auquière 

Brazil 

INMETRO (on behalf of CERFLOR) 

Rua Santa Alexandrina No 416, 10 andar 

Rio Comprido 

CEP 20.261-232 

Rio de Janeiro 

Brazil 

Tel: +55 21 2502 7002 

Fax: +55 21 2293 0954 

Email: presi@inmetro.gov.br 

43

Annex 2 – PEFC Belgium Charter 

CHARTER FOR SUSTAINABLE FOREST MANAGEMENT 

IN THE WALLOON REGION 

PEFC FINLAND: I am just curious to know why this annex has been attached to the 

review. I see no logical reasons. Are there any references to it in the text? 

At regional level 

Public and private forest owners and managers in the Walloon Region have jointly drawn 

up a progress plan for the sustainable management of Walloon forests. This notion has 

been defined by ministerial conferences on the Protection of Forests in Europe, in 

Helsinki and Lisbon. 

The Walloon Region has an effective mechanism, the Permanent Inventory of Forestry 

Resources, which makes it possible to assess the overall state and development of forests 

in Wallonia. 

The progress plan focuses on six areas for the entire Walloon Region: 

1. Developing integrated forestry layouts; 

2. Intensifying the study of how ecosystems function, monitoring of mortality, 

and the means to be implemented to tackle it; 

3. Limiting inputs in the forest to the strict minimum, i.e. phytocides, 

pesticides and fertilisers; 

4. Improving biodiversity in forests in terms of genera, species and 

ecosystems; 

5. Developing the information and training of owners, managers and subcontractors 

in forestry and sustainable management; 

6. Improving the reception of the public in the forest, whilst respecting 

ecosystems. 

These six objectives have been approved by a working group representing forestry 

production, wood processing, the environment, the university world and forest users in 

three meetings, which took place in Namur on 27th November 2000, 10th January and 

20th February 2001. 

45

In respect of individuals 

I would like to request the property for which I am responsible to be certified in terms of 

its sustainable management, in accordance with the Belgian certification procedure for 

sustainable forest management, in order to take part in the PEFC system for the mutual 

recognition of national certification systems. 

To do so, I undertake to: 

1. respect the applicable forestry regulation, in particular the Forestry Code, the 

Walloon Code for Town and Country Planning and Heritage, and the Nature 

Conservation Act; 

2. undertake training in sustainable forestry management; 

3. organise my forest by maintaining or even restoring the areas of particular biological 

interest (boundaries of deciduous forests along water courses, clearings and no new 

drainage in marshy and peaty areas); 

4. introduce species that are suited to the location with sufficient variety, in particular 

by using the ecological species file; 

5. establish mixed populations (mixing of species and/or ages, tree by tree or in groups 

and maintaining complementary species), as long as the location conditions and the 

structure of my property so permit; 

6. apply dynamic silviculture (suitably sporadic and intensive clearance) particularly in 

order to improve the amount of light that reaches the ground and the biodiversity of 

my populations, along with the water and mineral element cycles; 

7. leave old and dead trees in certain populations, within the required phytosanitary and 

safety limits; 

8. establish mechanical methods for soil preparation and clearance, in preference to 

chemical methods; 

9. promote organic and/or integrated protection methods for my plantations or 

populations; 

10. take into account the presence of unusual trees or populations on my property in 

order to envisage the collection of seeds from them, as a guarantee of the maintenance 

of the genetic wealth of the Walloon forest; 

11. only undertake clear cutting judiciously and never exceed a surface area of 10 ha in a 

single clearance; 

12. implement methods making it possible to guarantee a forest/game equilibrium, through 

the maintenance and/or development of shrub vegetation, along with grassy pastures 

46

and grazing, where the dimensions and structure of my property so permit and by the 

regulation of populations insofar as I am in control of them; 

13. accept the visit by an auditor whose job it is to check that I am respecting my 

commitments. 

Given at ………………, on …………… by …………………………. 

Signature 

Specification sheet 

Identification of the property 

Type of owner(s) 

Company 

Surname 

First name 

Status 

Address 

Post Code - Town 

Tel. 

Fax 

Mobile 

e-mail 

Municipality(ies) 

Surface area 

47

Annex 3: Questionnaire sent to NGOs and PEFC 

contact persons 

Based on the 12 criteria covered in the first edition of Behind the Logo 

1- Has the national PEFC standard been revised since 2001? 

If yes, has the revised standard been endorsed by the PEFCC yet? Which stakeholders 

were involved in the standard revision process? How? What are the major changes in the 

standard (is it more performance-based than before? Give examples. Does it include 

minimum requirements as regards to environmental and social issues such as indigenous 

peoples rights, set aside areas, etc. Have there been any changes as regards to governance, 

certification and accreditation issues)? 

2- Criteria II: Equal and balanced participation of a broad range of 

stakeholders 

2-1 What is the composition of the National Governing Body? Are all interested parties 

represented in an equal number? 

2-2 How are voting rights distributed among different parties represented in the National 

Governing Body? 

3- Criteria III: A labelling system, including a credible chain of custody 

Any changes regarding CoC certification since 2001? 

4- Criteria IV: Independent third-party assessments, adequate control 

mechanisms and stakeholder consultation 

4-1 Are there procedures to guide PEFC certification bodies? 

4-2 Are field visits mandatory before the forest is certified? 

4-3 In case of regional certification, are all forest areas in the regional certification scheme 

visited during certification or monitoring audits? If not, are there specific requirements as 

regards to sampling procedures? 

4-4 Are monitoring audits of the certificates required? If yes, who caries out the audits 

and how often are certificates revisited? What happens in case of non-compliance? 

4-5 Does the standard require consultation of interested partied during the certification 

process or during monitoring audits? If yes, what are the procedures for stakeholder 

consultation? 

5- Criteria V: Full transparency to all concerned parties and the public 

5-1 What are the requirements as regards to public disclosure of audit reports? 

5-2 Are the full audit reports of certifications readily available to all interested parties 

and/or to the general public? 

48

5-3 Are summary reports of certifications readily available to all interested parties and/or 

the general public? If yes, who is responsible for the contents and distribution of the 

summary report? 

5-4 How many full audits reports and/or summary reports are currently available from 

PEFC? Are they free of charge? 

6- Criteria VI: Certification at the forest management unit level, rather than 

at country or regional level 

6-1 Does the certification take place at the FMU level or at the regional level? How many 

certificates have been issued at the regional level vs. FMU level? 

6-2 Are there procedures for group certification and/or for individual certification? 

6-3 Does the certification of a region entail the certification of all forests in that region? 

6-4 Is there a procedure for group certification and/or individual certification outside a 

regional certification scheme? 

6-5 Have any certificate been issued to individual private forest owners or groups of 

forest owners outside a regional certification scheme? 

7- Criteria VII: Cost effectiveness and voluntary nature 

7-1 Is there a fixed cost/ha for certification? 

7-2 Are costs dependant on the type of forest ownership, the size of the forest holding, 

the region, and the type of certification carried out (forest management vs. CoC, regional 

vs. individual or group certification)? Give examples 

7-3 In case of regional or group certification, are there requirements to inform and consult 

all concerned forest owners before the certificate is issued? By whom is the decision to 

apply for certification ultimately taken? (forest owner association, marketing cooperative, 

etc.)? 

7-4 Are there minimum requirements as regards to the share of forest area whose owners 

are committed to certification before regional certification takes place? 

8- Criteria VIII: Commitments from the forest owner/manager to improving 

forest management 

8-1 What are the incentives for the forest owners to improve their forest management 

practices? 

8-2 Does the standard include requirements for substantial changes to existing practices in 

order to achieve SFM? 

8-3 Can a forest owner loose a certificate for non-compliance with the standard? Has this 

occurred? 

9- Criteria IX: Applicability to all forest sizes and tenure systems 

9-1 What is the proportion of private/public land certified by PEFC? 

9-2 What is the smallest and largest forest holding that has been certified by PEFC? 

49

10- Criteria X: An effective and transparent complaints procedure 

10-2 Is there a mechanism to deal with complaints and disputes regarding the standard 

and/or the certification procedure and/or accreditation decisions? If yes, how does it 

work? 

10-3 Who is allowed to bring forward a formal complaint to the board? Are external 

parties allowed to bring forward a complaint? 

10-4 Have any complaints been filled? 

11- Criteria XII: A transparent and high quality accreditation procedure 

11-1 Is accreditation operational (i.e. are third party, accredited certification bodies 

conducting the certification process and issuing certificates?) 

11-2 If yes, is it the national accreditation body or another body that accredits the PEFC 

certifiers? 

11-3 Does the accreditation body used by PEFC have forest-specific competence, 

including on social and environmental issues? 

11-4 Are there certifiers that have issued PEFC certificates without having been 

accredited by the national accreditation body? 

11-5 How many PEFC certifiers have been accredited and which ones are they (names)? 

12- Overall comments? 

50

References 

Dahl, L. April 2002. Bakom kulisserna – En analys av PEFC i Sverige 2002. WWF 

Sweden. 

Fern. Behind the Logo – An environmental and social assessment of forest certification 

schemes, May 2001. 

Finnish Nature League, April 2001. The development, standards and procedures of the 

Pan-European certification scheme in Finland, an introduction. Fern, April 2001. 

Indufor. Strengthening the PEFC Certification Framework. Helsinki, January 15, 2002. 

Lindahl, K. April 2001. Swedish case study for Behind the Logo on the development, 

standards and procedures of the Forest Stewardship Council and the Pan European Forest 

Certification Scheme. 

PEFC Sweden. Tekniskt dokument, 2002, available at www.pefc.se. Original with the 

author. 

PEFC Sweden. Vägledningsdokument, 2003, available at www.pefc.se. Original with the 

author. 

PEFC Sweden. Certifieringsbeslut och certifikat, 2003, available at www.pefc.se. Original 

with the author. 

PEFC Council. Technical Document, November 2002. 

PEFC Council. GL 2/2003: PEFC Council Minimum Requirements Checklist, April 2003. 

PEFC Council. Annex 4: Chain of Custody Certification of Wood, November 2002. 

PEFC Council. Statutes of the PEFC Council. 

PEFC Council. Annex 2: Rules for Standard Setting, November 2002. 

PEFC Council. Annex 3: Basis for Certification Schemes and their implementation, 

November 2002. 

PEFC Council. Annex 5: PEFC Logo Use Rules, November 2002. 

PEFC Council. Annex 6: Certification and Accreditation Procedures, November 2002. 

PEFC Council. Annex 7: Endorsement of Mutual Recognition of National Schemes and 

their Revision, November 2002. 

51

Footprints in the forest - Fern

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