FSC stakeholders can have confidence in the FSC Accreditation Program, concludes ISEAL peer audit - December 3rd, 2004

The findings from a peer audit of the FSC Accreditation Program, carried out by the International Social and Environmental Accreditation and Labelling Alliance (ISEAL), show that FSC stakeholders can have confidence in FSC accreditation and certification processes. The audit was carried out on October 18th - 19th, 2004 at the FSC International Center in Bonn, Germany.

The audit scope covered FSC accreditation of certification bodies and it did not consider the other programs operated by FSC such as approval of national working groups, contact persons and national standards. It was preceded by a thorough review of the Quality Management System (QMS) documentation of the FSC Accreditation Business Unit.

The audit concluded that current FSC accreditation processes can be relied upon to demonstrate that certificates issued by accredited certifiers are generally appropriate and can be relied upon to demonstrate the holder's compliance with FSC requirements.

Alistair Monument, Head of the Accreditation Program said: "The FSC accreditation team considers the ISEAL audit as exceptionally valuable and will use the recommendations fromthe report to further improve the operational procedures and their implementation."

"The audit team's confidence in the program stems from the enthusiasm and sound technical background of officers and experts implementing the FSC Accreditation Programme. The audit team noted great improvements in accreditation performance over the past three years," continued Alistair Monument.

In June 2004, ISEAL decided to conduct an audit of the accreditation activities of FSC and to evaluate FSC's compliance with the ISO Standard 17011:2004 in conjunction with IAF Guidance to ISO Guide 61. The audit was conducted by Mr. Richard Bradley (independent consultant, lead auditor) and Mr. Phillip Crocombe (Marine Stewardship Council, co-auditor).

FSC has been a member of ISEAL since December 1999. ISEAL members are committed to implementing international voluntary standard-setting and verification programs that comply with internationally accepted criteria. In order to evaluate compliance with membership criteria, ISEAL implemented a system of regular peer reviews for accreditation and standards-setting among their members.

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