‘Green-stamping’ of Timber Companies Comes Under Scrutiny

[nosmokes]

i had been wondering about this since i was thumbing through some mag in a doctor's office a few weeks back and it had one of those 3 page articles all about how to *go green.* one of the so called tips was to use certed lumber for a deck instead of the composite stuff. i thought that was a very strange thing to say. now it becomes much clearer. how low will they go? apparently just as low as it takes.-joe
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original-newstandard


‘Green-stamping’ of Timber Companies Comes Under Scrutiny

by Kari Lydersen

Conservationists say a major certifier of environmentally “sustainable” foresting practices in the US offers its approval too easily and is too hesitant to take action against firms that harm the environment.

Jan. 12 – The buzzword "green" has become a valuable marketing asset in the timber industry, but environmentalists say it is applied all-too readily, as one of the main certification programs merely provides a toothless form of "green-stamping."

In December, two conservation groups filed complaints with board members operating the certification program, the Sustainable Forestry Initiative, asking them to take a hard look at two companies' practices and demand changes. As consumers look for ecologically friendly products in everything from Christmas cards to furniture, environmentalists also see the challenges as an important test of the Initiative's own credibility in designating such products.

The complaints involve Plum Creek Timber, a major logging and real estate firm in the Northeast, and Weyerhaeuser, the largest timber company in the Pacific Northwest. Both companies' CEOs sit on the fifteen-person Sustainable Forestry Board, along with three other industry representatives, five CEOs of environmental groups and five members from the broader forestry field.

The Natural Resources Council of Maine complains that the Initiative has certified Plum Creek as "sustainable," even though last year, Maine fined the company $57,000 for illegal logging – the largest such penalty ever levied by the state.

According to internal documents obtained from various Maine agencies by the Natural Resources Council and reviewed by The NewStandard, Plum Creek allegedly committed several violations of state law, including logging too many trees without a permit, developing a power-line corridor without a permit, and polluting streams. Plum Creek also allegedly logged aggressively in deer wintering habitats, making them inhospitable for the animals during the harsh season.

The Sustainable Forestry Initiative's certification of Weyerhaeuser flies in the face of the Seattle Audubon Society' insistence that the corporation is to blame for harming endangered spotted owls with its logging in southwest Washington.

Under the Sustainable Forestry Initiative's rules, Weyerhaeuser and Plum Creek have 45 days to respond to the challenges. After that, Initiative staff will appoint one environmentalist, one forestry expert and one independent auditor to investigate the situation.

Bill Banzhaf, president of the Sustainable Forestry Board, told The NewStandard an investigation could lead to the complaints being dropped, or the companies could be ordered to make changes to maintain certification. The organization could also choose to decertify the companies if it finds they cannot comply with its criteria. Banzhaf said no company has been decertified in the past, though one was ordered to change its practices to maintain its certification.
Industry-Friendly Alternative?

The American Forest & Paper Association, an industry group, created the Sustainable Forestry Initiative in 1994. According to Banzhaf, the group currently certifies about 84 companies for activities in 126 million acres of forest.

Some environmentalists have long described the Initiative as a façade. They say corporations support it as an industry-friendly alternative to the Forest Stewardship Council, an international certification body with stricter standards and monitoring procedures.

Banzhaf said the Sustainable Forestry Initiative did have problems with neutrality in the 1990s, but has been completely independent of the American Forest & Paper Association since 2002.

Daniel Hall, of the nonprofit conservation group Forest Ethics, is skeptical.

"The is in our view the one credible forest-certification program out there," Hall told TNS.
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complete article here

[sandnsea]

1. Have to stay on it

I'm actually writing a piece on the hotel industry right now. There are two groups who actually seem to have a certification process, but there's another one that does nothing. The hotel pays to join and be featured on the web site, there's some green fluff, and that's it. Hotels are doing more and more environmentally, and the ones who are truly innovative should be recognized. Same for timber companies or any other business for that matter. I guess all we can do is get the info out there so people know which certification to pay attention to and which companies are truly green.

[nosmokes]

5. but how can a consumer keep up on which cert means anything?

you can't be on top of every sector. i guess we need a certifier for the certifiers so we know if they can be trusted, eh? like i know i can trust oregon tilth to be organic, but how do i know that restaurant isreally serving me organic beef when i'm travelling?

[sandnsea]

6. If you care, you find out

You find local businesses who care and rely on them. Our local flooring company is very environmentally conscious, for instance. The more people require that effort when they do business, the more business will care to get it right. Even if the government had a system, you couldn't do much about nonprofits that pretend to be certification agencies when they're more like a chamber of commerce. If every DUer took on our own specific industry, we could come up with an excellent resource in very short order.

[jpak]

2. Plum Creek is the worst

:puke:

[Peace Patriot]

3. The Forest Stewardship Council is equally bad, just has slicker P.R.

80% of the world's forests have been destroyed or seriously damaged--which doesn't mean just 80% or so fewer trees/timber volume to absorb C02 and prevent global warming, but also means horrendous impacts on biodiversity, water quality and other resources.

We have to STOP using wood products. Period. There is no such thing as "sustainable logging"--not any more.

The FSC farms out its "certifications" to private entities who are paid by the timber corporation. These "certifiers" then bend and break the rules--which are lax to begin with--to permit large-scale clear-cutting over vast areas, the use of poisons (herbicides, pesticides), conversion of natural forest to tree farms, and large-scale impacts on fish, wild life, water quality and other resources, on promises of future reform. Their "certification" process is a joke. What is possibly worst of all is that this privatization of the review of large-scale timber plans excludes the public and undermines public regulation of these public trust resources. I have personal experience of the impact of FSC "certification" on the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and its requirement that the public be permitted to review big environmental plans with serious potential impacts, and it is very clear to me that the FSC is another corporate privatization scheme, possibly even more damaging to the environment and to the rights of the public than the SFI, because of the participation of some of the Big Greens (Sierra Club, Greenpeace), who no longer have control of the standards or the "certification" process, due to the influence of the World Bank, Big Timber and other corporate interests. It was once a well-intended organization. It no longer is. There is a movement to get the Big Greens to renounce the FSC and leave the organization, due to the FSC's numerous bad "certifications."

I've also reviewed a study of FSC "certifications" worldwide, and it appears to me that what is happening is that the last of the earth's forests--like the last of the earth's oil--is now being plundered by the corporate rulers and the super-rich, and that, in order to mollify markets of increasingly wary wood consumers, they have had to come up with some bullshit about it being "green." The SFI merely invented their own bullshit process; while others have co-opted the FSC process and turned it to the purpose of environmental degradation and exploitation, riding on the FSC's past reputation as a somewhat decent organization.

There is NO "certification" label for wood that is trustworthy.* We must, 1) use recycled wood, 2) find alternative building materials, and 3) start PLANTING millions and millions of trees, not cutting them down. Or are planet is gone.

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*(I will make only one exception to this--and that would be some very small timber operations run by some Native American tribes--but, if you are in the market for wood, you are not likely to find any from these operations, because they are so small. Also, the FSC does not differentiate between these very few, small operations and the big timber corporations, in placing their label on the wood. This is what I mean by NO label is trustworthy. You CANNOT trust the FSC label. MOST of the wood they label is from VERY bad timber operations. And I make this exception based more on the right of Native American tribes to benefit from their land at subsistence levels, than from any illusions that cutting down trees these days is a good thing to do, in any circumstance. It is not. But with Native Americans, who have tried to do the thing right, it is a matter of justice. They should not be penalized for the wrong-doing of ALL of the corporate loggers.)

[nosmokes]

7. i disagree w/ you there peace pat.

there are ways of sustainable and responsible logging. i do agree that what little is left of original/old growth needs to be left alone, but since there are millions of acres of forests that are essentially tree farms, ressponsible logging and milling of that woodland can and should be done. logging and mill work pays well and can be the backbone support of small towns, which i personally am a big fan of. there are lots of environmental and social benefits to having small towns, and you can't have towns w/o jobs.

[nam78_two]

4. K&R-doesn't surprise me in the slightest.nt