True to its values of participation, democracy, and equity, FSC, with the financial support of the Programme de Promotion de l’Exploitation certifiée des forêts (PPECF) has been supporting FSC national forest stewardship standards (NFSS) development processes in three countries of the Congo Basin region. This process that started in 2015 aims at contextualizing FSC International Generic Forest Management Indicators in the three countries concerned.
In each country, the process is led by a Standard Development Group (SDG) composed of representatives of the three economic, social and environmental chambers and independent experts in accordance with FSC procedures.
Each national process involves alternating several phases of deliberations on indicators in the process of contextualization, a field test in a forest concession, and two phases of consultations with a wide range of stakeholders in forest management.
At the end of 2019, the finalized draft standards were submitted to the Policy and Standards Unit (PSU) office in Bonn.
As we reach the end of the first quarter of 2020 here is an update from the three concerned countries: Cameroon, Congo, and Gabon.
On January 29th, 2020, one last meeting was held in Brazzaville (Republic of Congo) in the FSC office to examine and reach consensus on the closure of the Policy and Standards Committee (PSC) national standards approval conditions. Subsequently, the National Forest Stewardship Standards (NFSS) were re-submitted to PSU in early April for evaluation.
The SDG in Cameroon met on February 7th, 2020, at the Tou’Ngou Hotel in Yaoundé, with the same objective of addressing PSC ‘s approval conditions.
The NFSSes for those two countries shall be published as soon as PSU approves the addressed conditions.
The last meeting for the Gabonese SDG took place from the 14 to 16th March 2020 and was specifically organized to integrate indicators for community forests as well as to address the latest PSU comments.
The Gabonese NFSS is now undergoing the approval process and shall be evaluated and approved by PSC in their meeting of May 2020.