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 is seeking candidates for the role of ‘FSC Regional Membership Coordinators’ to support us in the preparation process for the upcoming General Assembly; this includes keeping members informed, supporting/facilitating the motions development and discussion process and galvanizing cross-chamber dialogue.
FSC has extended the consultation period regarding the first draft of its Asia-Pacific Regional Forest Stewardship Standard for Smallholders (RFSS) until 15 July 2020.
FSC International, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH), the French Agricultural Research Centre for International Development (CIRAD), the University of Liège and Biotope are interested to hear your perspectives and opinions on their collaboration plan for a global discussion on High Value Forests.
This first version of the FSC Forest Stewardship Standard for Ecuador applies to all categories of management units operating in natural forest and plantations and becomes effective on 1 November 2022.
The new standard will contribute to promoting responsible forest management, focusing on the inclusion of small producers, biodiversity management, and the protection of Indigenous rights. It will come into effect on 1 October 2025.
Bukut Muria Jaya – a subsidiary of the Djarum Group - withdrew its FSC certificate and that has ended the association between FSC and the Djarum Group.
Malaysian environmentalist, Anthony Sebastian, has been appointed as the Chairman of the International Board of Directors of the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC). Sebastian’s term of office runs from 10 November 2014 to 10 November 2015.
FSC is seeking candidates for a technical working group to revise its Forest Management Evaluations Standard and its associated addenda. The call for applicants is open until 20 November 2020.
The present document contains certification requirements for certifying forest operations in Mexico, 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 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 from smallholders in plantations in Indonesia, 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 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.
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.