Responsible Wood continues to grow from strength to strength, with the growth of the Australian scheme recognised during the PEFC General Assembly in Wurzburg, Germany. Source: Timberbiz
The PEFC Family gathered to celebrate 20 years of PEFC, the world’s largest forest certification scheme.
For Responsible Wood, Australia’s largest forest certification scheme, the anniversary marks an important milestone in the development of global sustainable forest management standards.
Responsible Wood CEO Simon Dorries reflected on the important role the Australian scheme has played in growing the scheme.
“Responsible Wood, then the Australian Forestry Standard, and ‘CERTFOR’ in Chile, were the first forest certification schemes outside of Europe mutually recognised and internationally endorsed by PEFC International,” he said.
“This marked an incredibly important milestone and, from 2004 onwards, the PEFC Family has grown globally with many countries joining the PEFC alliance.”
Today, PEFC has more than 310 million hectares of global forest area under certification with more than 11.5 million hectares of defined forest area in Australia alone.
“In Australia, more than 90% of all commercial forest area is covered by Responsible Wood certification, a combination of native forest and plantation forests,” Mr Dorries said.
