Letter to the editor: forest certification

Kathy Abusow of Sustainable Forestry Initiative responds to Grist's green-buying tips

Posted by Grist at 9:30 AM on 12 Feb 2008

Read more about: consumerism | greenwashing | logging | deforestation | green living

Here is a letter to the editor from Kathy Abusow of Sustainable Forestry Initiative, Inc., written in response to our article featuring tips for buying green products and avoiding greenwashed ones.

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Dear Editor:

I am writing in response to an article that your website ran titled "Is It Really Green?" It was disappointing to read your statement about the Sustainable Forestry Initiative Standard® (SFI®). The fact is, SFI is an independent nonprofit organization and internationally endorsed forest certification program that is positively influencing the markets for certified forest products while improving forest practices across North America and promoting responsible procurement globally through the SFI Standard.

As your article suggests, it can be difficult to differentiate between "green claims" in the marketplace. However, third-party audited forest certification programs like the SFI Standard make it easy for consumers, by providing a comprehensive labeling system that provides the assurance that the forest products they purchase come from well-managed forests and are legal.

The SFI program has the support of numerous conservation groups including NatureServe, The Conservation Fund, and Conservation International. In addition, SFI works with conservation groups to provide real, tangible benefits on 143 million acres across North America. We also work with nongovernmental organizations, such as Forest Trends and the World Bank, to seek solutions to the important issue of illegal logging. At the community level, we engage in many ways. A recent example is in Minnesota where SFI volunteers are giving their time to build a Habitat for Humanity home that will provide housing with wood from responsibly managed forests.

At a time when only 10 percent of the world's forests are certified, we should not be playing favorites among the more than 50 forest certification standards worldwide. Improving forest management will require much more than that -- Grist can be part of that solution by providing your audiences with the facts and a balanced story.

Sincerely,
Kathy Abusow
President & CEO
Sustainable Forestry Initiative, Inc.

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Grist editors offer links for more info:

The Sustainable Forestry Initiative website.
The Don't Buy SFI website, maintained by an alliance of environmental groups that includes Greenpeace, the National Wildlife Federation, the Rainforest Action Network, and the Sierra Club.
A 2004 Grist article about SFI. We haven't done an update since this article was published, so some of SFI's policies and practices may have changed in the four years since. As Abusow points out, the group did become an independent nonprofit last year. Its board still includes a number of executives from major timber companies, including Weyerhaeuser, International Paper, and Plum Creek Timber.

For story: Letter to the editor: forest certification
1 Comment | Post a Comment

Pretty empty

If SFI is interested in establishing themselves as a credible green standard for forest products, they need to realize that, whatever their current status, their history as an organ of the timber industry makes them inherently suspect -- and for good reason.

They could start by addressing the issues raised in the linked Grist article: protection of old-growth forests, protection of biodiversity, protection of sensitive forests overseas, and protection of the rights of native and indigenous peoples. These issues were also quite true and valid at the time this article was written. Have things changed?

Given where they are coming from, SFI is going to need to work to establish their credibility, not make some vague statements that amount to "something is better than nothing". Particularly when the fact of the matter is that something is NOT necessarily better than nothing. A certification standard that lets the uninformed consumer believe they are making environmentally sound buying decisions while failing to provide actual ecological protection is worse than nothing.

Ms. Abusow should consider the possibility that part of the reason such a small fraction of the world's timber is certified may be because only a small fraction of the world's timber production CAN be performed in a sustainable and ecologically sound fashion.

by GreenEngineer at 11:33 AM on 12 Feb 2008

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