VicForests has decided to postpone achieving the FSC Controlled Wood Standard by the end of 2020. This decision is based off multiple restrictions impeding completing the assessment. Source: Timberbiz
These restrictions include:
- COVID-19 restrictions on international auditors which impacted their ability to complete their in-field coupe assessments to satisfy the fieldwork component of the assessment,
- remaining challenges arising from last summer’s bushfires,
- The legal issues regarding VicForests’ upcoming appeal against the Federal Court decision,
- Concerns VicForests will not receive a fair assessment owing to FSC Australia governance. This includes three directors of FSC Australia who are leading public activism and advocacy, calling for the complete cessation of native forestry and actively seeking to discredit VicForests.
VicForests has called for the three Forest Stewardship Council directors to be sacked for allegedly breaching FSC standards and damaging FSC’s reputation, in a letter of complaint to the certification body’s international headquarters in Germany.
The directors are Sarah Rees, Chris Taylor and Peter Cooper. The Australian Forest Products Association, in a formal complaint to FSC Australia, has also urged the removal of Ms Rees and Mr Cooper from the board if an FSC investigation found their actions contravened Australian FSC’s standards and constitution.
In April VicForests became ineligible for membership of the Forest Stewardship Council of Australia because it has failed to achieve Controlled Wood Standard within the required time.
However, this does not mean that Vicforests will be denied Controlled Wood Standard accreditation in the future. VicForests’ CEO Monique Dawson said in April that to retain FSC membership accreditation needed to be achieved with “a reasonable time”.
She had been told that was two years, and Vicforests had been outside that limit for some time.
She said FSC had been “a bit uncomfortable” with the situation for a time. But Ms Dawson said she doubted any organisation had been able to achieve accreditation within the two-year timeframe.
In a statement released yesterday VicForests said it remained committed to demonstrating conformance to international standards for forest management certification.
This included focusing its efforts on consolidating the significant changes that it has made by introducing and implementing adaptive harvest and regeneration management systems and ensuring there was a clear alignment with the current and emerging forest management frameworks.
