This is your go-to space for all editions of the FSC General Assembly Members Bulletin. Here, you will find key updates, deadlines, resources, and stories curated to help you stay informed and engaged in the lead-up to the FSC General Assembly 2025. Each issue highlights important developments, motions, and opportunities for participation—ensuring you are well prepared to shape the future of FSC.
The importance of forest stewardship is more apparent than ever as we face global challenges such as climate change, biodiversity loss, and social inequities. The FSC Global Strategy 2021-2026 focuses on growing our reach by demonstrating the value and benefits of forest stewardship in combatting these challenges and achieving our 2050 vision of resilient forests sustaining life on earth.
The FSC Global Membership Meeting 2020 presented a general overview and highlights of the achievements in 2020, and general priorities and key issues for 2021.
In order to accommodate several time zones and enable the participation of our members from all regions, the session was held in the morning and repeated in the afternoon. Both sessions ran live and contained the same discussions.
Over 400 registered participants from around the world joined the presentations and subsequent discussions. You can find the meeting recordings and presentations below.
During this session, we will present the motion submission schedule and we will have a demo on how to submit a motion through the FSC Motions platform.
FSC Ukraine and other Ukrainian organizations jointly organized an international research conference to address challenges faced by the Ukraine forestry sector, and also to explore the opportunity FSC certification represents for the country and the CIS region. The participants also developed a resolution addressed to the Ukrainian government calling for a reform of the national forest sector. The resolution includes the recommendation to use FSC forest management (FM) certification as best practice.
On 26 and 27 November, the Forest Stewardship Council Regional Meeting of Indigenous Peoples was held in “Ciudad del Saber” (Panama) in a climate of brotherhood and cordiality.
FSC, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH), the French Agricultural Research Centre for International Development (CIRAD), the University of Liège and Biotope are pleased to announce their collaboration to join the global discussion on forests, particularly forest landscapes, forest climate, forest biodiversity and forest peoples’ resilience.
On this International Women’s Day, take a look at how the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) is exploring diversity and gender equity in sustainable forestry
FSC International, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich, the French Agricultural Research Centre for International Development, the University of Liège and Biotope are pleased to announce their collaboration to join the global discussion on forests.
The Forest Management Groups standard (FSC-STD-30-005) is the first forest solution delivered by New Approaches team and has been revised and approved by the FSC International Board of Directors on November 19, less than two years after the establishment of the working group in charge of the revision.
The final results of the Mangifera and Dalbergia wood species transaction verification loop (TV loop) highlight a number of supply chain integrity concerns pertaining to FSC certificate holders, specifically from India. The main findings include fraudulent documentation and large volumes of false claims.
FSC today released new statistics that show violations of FSC certification requirements or errors in its charcoal supply chain have been significantly reduced.
The present document contains certification requirements for certifying forest operations in Central America, developed in accordance with FSC's normative document for the development and maintenance of FSC Forest Stewardship Standards. Revisions of FSC Forest Stewardship Standards are ongoing, and all existing standards will be transferred to the revised Principles & Criteria version 5-2. All standards are valid until replaced by a new FSC Forest Stewardship Standard.
The present document contains certification requirements for certifying forest operations as described in the scope of this standard. All standards are valid until replaced by a new FSC Forest Stewardship Standard.
The present document contains certification requirements for certifying forest operations in plantations in Uruguay, developed in accordance with FSC's normative document for the development and maintenance of Forest Stewardship Standards. Revisions of Forest Stewardship Standards are ongoing, and all existing standards will be transferred to the revised Principles & Criteria version 5-2. All standards are valid until replaced by a new Forest Stewardship Standard.
The present document contains certification requirements for certifying forest operations from smallholders in plantations in Vietnam, developed in accordance with FSC's normative document for the development and maintenance of FSC Forest Stewardship Standards. Revisions of FSC Forest Stewardship Standards are ongoing, and all existing standards will be transferred to the revised Principles & Criteria version 5-2. All standards are valid until replaced by a new FSC Forest Stewardship Standard.
FSC had decided to waive the Annual Administration Fee (AAF) for all types of certifications in Ukraine from Q2/2022 until the end of Q4/2024, regardless of their certification status.
In August 2024, FSC decided to reinstate the AAF for certifications in Ukraine starting 01 January 2025 in a phased approach.
This Advice Note serves to implement this decision.
The following requirements aim to ensure that the certification body decision making entity has sufficient information on which to base its decisions with respect to conformity with FSC forest stewardship standards, and to help FSC ensure that there is consistency in decision making between different certification bodies.
The social impacts of forest management mean that forest management is a social as a well as a technical activity. It is not possible to involve all stakeholders in every forest evaluation. It is therefore essential that forest certification and its results should be open to public scrutiny. This is the only way to demonstrate to all interested or affected parties that the certification decisions are justified and acceptable. It is a basic requirement of the FSC scheme that certification bodies make a summary report of each certified forest operation publicly available.
Depending on when the unacceptable activity occurs/occurred, FSC will determine which policy version is used as the point of reference. If the unacceptable activity occurred prior to 2023, version 2-0 of the policy will be applied, whereas if the unacceptable activity occurs in 2023 or beyond, version 3-0 of the Policy for Association will be applied. To access Policy for Association, version 2-0, click here . The Policy for Association is an expression of the values shared by individuals and organizations associated with FSC. It defines six unacceptable activities that associated individuals and organizations and their corporate group commit to avoid in both certified and non-certified operations. The Policy for Association serves as a risk management tool for FSC, protecting the credibility and reputation of the FSC brand and organizations associated with it.
This guide is intended for organizations that wish to use the FSC trademarks for the promotion of FSC-certified labelled products or services and it replaces the FSC-STD-50-002 'Requirements for promotional use of the FSC trademarks by non-certificate holders' that was withdrawn on 31st May 2020.