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By John Heissenbuttel Vice President-Forestry & Wood Products American Forest & Paoer Association

t\lzertification of forest management practices is a growing trend in the U.S. and is here to stay. But, in reality, certification is not a new concept to forestry. Certification of forest management practices has been around for many years. The American Tree Farm System (ATFS), the world's oldest sustainable forestry and certification program will soon celebrate its 60th anniversary. Some 66,000 non-industrial private landowners with over 25 million acres are enrolled in the ATFS.

The American Forest & Paper Association sponsors the world's largest sustainable forestry and certification program in the world, the Sustainable Forestry Initiative, developed in 1994. In June of this year, the ATFS and the SFI program entered into a mutual recognition agreement whereby each program recognized the other as credible sustainable forestry and certification programs for non-industrial and industrial ownerships respectively. Combined, these two programs have close to 100 million acres of forestland enrolled. These programs, and others, are already having significant impacts on the forest products industry and forest management here in the U.S.

The SFI program is clearly having positive impacts on the management of our forests. Under the SFI program, some 6.5 million acres of forestland have been reforested and over 44,000 independent loggers and foresters have been trained in sustainable forestry practices. The SFI program has grown rapidly now to include over J2 million acres and SFI participants represent aboutTOTo of industrial roundwood consumption in the U.S. Of the 72 million acres enrolled in the SFI program, over 56 million acres of forestland in the U.S. and Canada will have been independently third party certified by the end of 2001.

The volume and value of certified wood and paper products labeled as such is currently very small, but is increasing as more retail outlets formulate policies to encourage their sale. The demand is being driven almost entirely by buyers groups and direct actions by environmental groups against major retailers such as The Home Depot, Lowe's, 84 Lumber, Wickes, Centex, Andersen Windows and others. To date, it does not appear that certified products command any kind of premium in the marketplace, so the extra costs associated with certification must be absorbed by the producer and/or the landowner. And these costs vary widely depending on the requirements necessary to achieve con- formance with a particular program in a particular location. According to a study by the Research Triangle Institute, landowners in the southeastern United States need to obtain a price premium of as much as l4Vo to offset the costs associated with a certification program promoted by the Forest Stewardship Council. This does not include the costs associated with chain of custody tracking, a component of certification that enables labeling of certified products.

As more producers and landowners participate in certification programs, certified products will become more available. Manufacturers are hoping that certified products will command higher prices, but the market for wood products is highly competitive, and wood consumers are notoriously price sensitive. It is still too early to know if and how much of the added costs of certification will be reflected in the marketplace and how much will be internalized over the course of growing stands of timber. However, the main goal of these programs is sustainable forest management that, in turn, translates into a sustained supply of wood products. Over the long term. maintaining a stable, sustainable and secure supply of affordable wood products is in the best interest of manufacturers, landowners, and consumers.

Certification of forest management practices is here to stay. The SFI program has moved rapidly to continue to meet the expectations of customers and the marketplace and will be a growing force in supplying certified products from well-managed forests in the years to come.