This month Danzer discusses its stance on illegal logging and advises companies on how they can procure responsibly.
Danzer UK, part of Danzer Group, sees the responsible procurement of timber as a major priority. The company’s initial objective is to ensure that all timber that enters the supply chain is of legal origin as a minimum requirement.
Danzer Group enhanced its in-house procurement rules by becoming signatories to the UK Timber Trade Federation Responsible Purchasing Policy (RPP) in 2006. This gives a systematic approach to managing a supply chain.
RPP is a company procurement policy with environmental commitments towards procurement activities. It is also a risk assessment procedure that enables companies to evaluate 100% of suppliers to monitor their ability to support company procurements policy on an ongoing basis. It also requires companies to submit an annual management report to summarise their achievements. An annual independent third party audit takes place to assure the compliance with the policy and targets continuous improvement.The RPP is a toolkit that assists Danzer and other companies in managing the supply chain. In particular, the RPP has been developed to assist companies to show compliance with the UK Timber Trade Federation (TTF) Code of Conduct and the UK Government Procurement Policy on timber.
The policy has been developed through extensive consultation with both the industry and external stakeholders (Government, ENGOs and industry consultants) to ensure that it can be readily assimilated into timber procurement operations.
The RPP is not a certification scheme but a tool to gather and evaluate evidence for the legality and sustainability of non-certified timber products.
Danzer supports international efforts to improve forest management and recognises that the independent certification of forests and the process chain is the most useful tool for providing assurances that timber comes from legal and well managed forests.
Most timber users would recognise the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) label as a guarantee that goods are legal and sustainable. FSC certified products are generally available with timber that originates in Europe and less so in tropical timber supply areas. There are also many other certification/third party verification of legality initiatives which are worthy of consideration.
For example, the following forest certification schemes have also been approved by the UK Government as proof of both legality and sustainability and as such should be given equal status with FSC; the Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification schemes (PEFC), mostly applies to goods originating from European forests, Sustainable Forestry Initiative scheme (SFI), and the Canadian Standards Association scheme (CSA).
Another RPP commitment is not to encourage boycotts or bans on specific species of timber, provided they can be sourced within an environmentally responsible framework. As such Danzer continues to do a healthy trade in tropical hardwoods. Danzer sources its products both from in-house Danzer Group sawmills in Africa, where the company manages its own forest concessions, and from third party suppliers. All suppliers are vetted within the RPP and the in-house Danzer Group Procurement Rules to ensure they have credible environmental credentials.
In the absence of full forestry certification, with the help of suppliers Danzer has put in place a stepwise approach relating to the supply of timber. This requires; documentary verification of legality (assessed within the RPP), third party verification of legality (full third party audited confirmation of legality), forest management plan agreed and working towards full forestry certification and full forestry certification (full proof of legality and sustainability).
Examples of the third party verification of legality schemes in Africa are; SGS Timber Legality & Traceability Verification scheme (TLTV) and FSC Controlled Wood Standard (FSC CWS).
Timber that has obtained FSC Controlled Wood Standard can be mixed with other fully certified FSC timber and sold with the FSC mixed label. For instance, the Danzer Group sawmill in Congo-Brazzaville, IFO, has achieved both TLTV and FSC CWS third party legality verification status, has recently had its forest management plan approved and is working towards obtaining full FSC certification. To date, this process has taken over five years and is still a work in progress.
All of the above schemes, whether FSC certified or TLTV third party legality verified, require each party that takes responsibility for the timber (whether in the UK or overseas) to have a chain of custody registration in place. Without this the integrity of the scheme is breached and the certificate cannot be passed along the supply chain.
This is not to say that timber supplied against these third party legality verification schemes is not sustainable. On the contrary, many suppliers in tropical areas either already have or are working towards an approved forest management plan and strictly work within their obligations.
However, the logistics involved in obtaining third party proof of this in the form of a full certification scheme, such as PEFC or FSC in a tropical area are much more difficult, expensive and lengthy than in a temperate area.
Danzer’s remit is to make every effort to investigate the dynamics of the supply chain and to give every supplier the opportunity to supply, based on a full understanding of individual environmental merit.
Providing customers with the environmental peace of mind they seek means more than just providing them with a limited supply of certified timber species – it means finding solutions to satisfy the diversity of their needs.
