Growing hunger for resources – shrinking forests?

Forests face immense and growing pressures throughout the world - illegal exploitation, poor management and conversion to other land uses often result in severe degradation or complete destruction.

Almost 15 years ago FSC was established to address these concerns.
A key factor behind the threats faced by natural forests is their lack of value seen by society at large. FSC uses certification as a tool to improve social and environmental standards in forest management practices worldwide. FSC requirements ensure that forests maintain the values and benefits they provide to society. By providing a market differentiation mechanism, FSC enables responsible forest managers to capture more value from their forests, allowing them to compete with pressures from other land uses and the artificially low prices of predatory and illegal logging.

Demand for forest products around the world will not only continue but accelerate. This means that parts of natural forests will inevitably be used for production purposes. It is in these areas where FSC can bring substantial social and environmental improvements and ultimately support the conservation and long-term maintenance of these forests.

FSC is a multi-stakeholder organization equitably involving social, environmental and economic stakeholders from the Global South and Global North in decision-making. FSC works by bringing people together from the environmental, social and business perspective to promote responsible forest management and to jointly find solutions to the problems created by bad forestry practices.

We are pleased to announce the following panelists:

• Mr. Christoph Thies, Forest Campaigner Greenpeace International
• Mr. Marcedonio Cortave, Director of the ACOFOP Association of Forest Communities of Peten, Guatemala
• Mr. Hans Schipulle, Chairman and Facilitator of the Congo Basin Forestry Partnership CBFP, Bonn, Germany 
• Mr. Andreas Heusler, Director Precious Woods Holding Ltd, Zurich, Switzerland

Mr. Stefan Salvador, FSC Chain of Custody Program Manager will moderate the discussion.