CERTFOR celebrates 10 years of PEFC endorsement

14 November 2014 News

10 years ago, CERTFOR, the Chilean System for Sustainable Forest Management Certification, achieved the international recognition of PEFC, marking the future for sustainable forestry in Chile.

“The endorsement of CERTFOR was an important milestone for PEFC, because Chile was the first non-European country to successfully achieve global recognition of its national forest certification system,” said Ben Gunneberg, Secretary General of PEFC International.

“CERTFOR is an example that many other countries around the world followed, including the United States (SFI and ATFS), Canada (CSA), Brazil (CERFLOR), Uruguay (PEFC Uruguay) and Argentina (CerFoAr) in the Americas, and more recently in Asia, such as Malaysia, China and Indonesia. Today, 1.9 million hectares of Chilean forests are certified as sustainably managed, covering 54% of the PEFC-certified area in South America.”

CERTFOR was created back in 2002 as the result of a multi-stakeholder project, and two years later in 2004, the country successfully achieved PEFC endorsement of its national system - becoming the first internationally recognized certification system to be established in the forestry sector of Chile.

This month CERTFOR celebrates 10 years of partnership with PEFC, fulfilling and growing every year to promote the sustainability of the forest, wood and paper industry within the country.

“Celebrating a decade has not only meant the support of this important international body (PEFC), but also the need for CERTFOR - the first label for sustainable forest management in Chile – to continually evaluate their management and update their standards and procedures, in order to continue meeting PEFC requirements and provide Chilean forest owners and companies, we well as consumers, with confidence in the label,” said Susan Benedetti, Chairman of CertforChile, the organization responsible for running the country’s national system.

Since 2004 there has been steady growth in the number of certified companies in the country, expanding in particular in the graphic sector following the certification of the first printing press in 2008. Today, 58% of the Chain of Custody certified companies are printing presses, which chose to move towards certification to demonstrate their commitment to sustainability and to meet the higher requirements of their customers in the printing sector who require the PEFC label.

However, it is not just the figures that demonstrate the contribution of CERTFOR/PEFC certification to the country. André Laroze, Executive Secretary of CertforChile, noted that “we have also succeeded in imposing a continuous improvement in the conditions of forest workers, raised the technical requirements of forest management and promoted friendly relations between businesses and communities.”