Discussion Paper on FSC Criteria 6.9, 6.10

Building on the FSC Plantations Review Recommendations - A Joint Restoration and Biodiversity Offsets Approach

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This discussion paper was presented during the FSC General Assembly in June 2011. Read below for the Executive Summary or download the full discussion paper as a PDF. See coverage of the issue on Mongabay.com.

Executive Summary

In the forest-rich countries of tropical Asia, the forest industry is undergoing a transition away from logging of natural forests to a plantation resource base as natural forest log production declines rapidly, and there is a growing timber supply deficit in the region. Sabah, Malaysia, where the FSC General Assembly will be held this month, provides an illustrative example of this transition. Existing FSC certification requirements prohibit the conversion of significant areas of natural forest to timber or fibre plantations unless there is a change of ownership. The result is that FSC is struggling to retain its relevance in tropical Asia and its ability to influence this conversion process and subsequent plantation management. In Sabah, despite a government mandate to long-term forest concession license holders to achieve FSC certification by 2014, almost all of the 2.5 million hectares of forest that these license holders manage will be ineligible for FSC certification.

In response to stakeholder concerns, FSC has recognised the need to revisit the conversion requirements. A Plantations Review was undertaken in two phases starting in 2004 and ending in 2009. The recommendation of the technical working group reviewing the conversion requirements was that reform was needed and that plantation owners and managers should be required to restore areas converted from natural forest in order to qualify for certification. This recommendation had a number of pros and cons but was ultimately not endorsed by the FSC Board of Directors. In 2011 FSC is undertaking a revision of the Principles and Criteria (P&C), which offers an excellent opportunity for consideration of the conversion criteria.

In this paper we propose that a new approach is explored. Restoration of plantation areas back to natural forest would in many cases result in plantation owners and managers incurring prohibitively high direct and opportunity costs of restoration, and experience suggests that such restoration is likely to take decades and restored areas are highly unlikely to regain ecological viability. This new approach combines the restoration obligation recommended by the technical working group, which would be retained for riparian reserves, steep slopes or areas of high conservation value for their watershed protection function, with a new biodiversity offset obligation for areas of biological high conservation value that can be met by purchasing offset credits from a series of FSC-certified conservation banks across the region. Conservation banks are long-term biodiversity offset projects that restore, protect and enhance the high conservation values of degraded or threatened natural forest areas and incorporate a permanent, non-wasting endowment fund that provides sustainable long-term financing. Such areas already retain significant levels of ecological viability as well as expert conservation managers and so help make restoration and conservation significantly more cost-effective. Monitoring and accountability levels are also higher as offset credit production can be directly linked to verified conservation works on the ground.

Biodiversity offsets and conservation banks are well established as a legal requirement in the USA, where the market for offset credits has a value of in excess of US $3 billion per annum. In addition, the Business and Biodiversity Offsets Programme (BBOP) of international NGO Forest Trends have developed a large body of methodologies, guidance materials and a series of pilot projects worldwide. BBOP have also published a set of Principles to guide best practice in biodiversity offset design. We outline some of the key methodological approaches that could be used by FSC in this paper. New Forests has established the first tropical conservation bank, the Malua Wildlife Habitat Conservation Bank, in Sabah, based on the US model that it is offering as a potential pilot site for assisting FSC in evaluating and testing the new approach. Malua Wildlife Habitat Conservation bank achieved full FSC forest management certification in June 2011.

If introduced, the changes to the FSC P&C proposed in this paper would enable significant expansion of certified plantation and natural forest area in tropical Asia whilst at the same time ensuring there is "no net loss" of high conservation values by securing significant new and additional funding from plantation managers for cost-effective restoration and conservation of high conservation values in conservation banks across the region. The proposed approach would also remove the "ownership loophole" in current requirements as the restoration and offset obligations would be associated with the land and trees, rather than with the owner or manager.

This paper is a discussion document and we hope it stimulates a fruitful cross-chamber discussion that leads to a positive outcome for tropical Asian forests. View full text as a PDF.

More Information

For further information please contact:

Darius Sarshar
New Forests Asia Sdn Bhd
dsarshar@newforests.com.au