Environment groups have renewed calls for WA’s Forest Products Commission (FPC) to have its controlled wood accreditation withdrawn. Source: ABC News
The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) accreditation is provided so consumers can be assured they are buying from ethical forest managers and companies. But the Wilderness Society and the Australian Conservation Foundation said despite the certification, karri logging had been wrongly endorsed.
Wilderness Society national forest campaign manager Warrick Jordan said FSC auditors had not considered all the available information in the past.
“What’s happened is the FSC auditors have come in and they’ve missed some crucial information about threatened species, habitat and impacts of logging,” he said.
“So we’ve seen FSC and their auditor Woodmark come in, and really what they need to do is clean up their act and ensure that FSC-certified logging isn’t damaging high-conservation-value threatened species habitats.
“There are species like the endangered western ringtail possum and the red-tailed black cockatoo, and they have important habitats that have been damaged by logging.”
The FPC was last issued with a certificate in October 2014. Since then, Soil Association Woodmark has carried out an audit, which environmentalists said was in response to their concerns.
Mr Jordan said there were precedents for the withdrawal of accreditation.
“It’s happened in Victoria where we’ve seen certificates in similar circumstances withdrawn and it’s happened regularly in other parts of the world,” he said.
“I think the most recent example in Australia is in 2013 in South Australia, where there was an issue with koala habitat and logging in a particular area, and in that case a certificate was suspended and the company was given a set of instructions or directions about what was required [for them] to actually go and fix the problem.
“So it’s actually something that happens quite commonly in the FSC system, and one of the things that does make the system robust is that there is a complaints process that can be run through, and [it] often comes through with good conclusions.”
FPC said it was yet to receive the final report from the most recent audit.
In a statement, FPC general manager Vince Erasmus said the commission could not comment on the outcome.
Mr Erasmus said the auditor spent a considerable amount of time talking to stakeholders, considering the issues and consulting a wide range of scientific experts.
The statement also said only a small proportion of total karri forest was harvested annually.
The FPC would continue to work with stakeholders “to ensure that Western Australia’s karri forests are managed in accordance with environmentally sound, socially acceptable and economically viable forest practices”, the statement said.
