reminder: secondary manufacturers and printers to follow the FSC controlled wood standard in 2008

14 December 2007

On the 1st of January 2008, the FSC Controlled Wood standard FSC-STD-40-005 will become applicable to all companies producing FSC-mixed products, which contain virgin material not covered by FSC certification.

While the standard is already applicable to primary manufacturers, it is new for printing houses and secondary manufacturers. We hereby kindly remind these companies to be aware of this new requirement and ensure that they adapt prior to their FSC audit in 2008.

Key requirements of the Controlled Wood standard

In brief, starting 2008 all non-FSC certified material which is mixed with certified material during processing must be with controlled origin according to the FSC Controlled Wood standard (FSC-STD-40-005 version 2-1).

The standard requires that all non-FSC certified materials must come from non-controversial sources.

Companies can do so either by sourcing FSC Controlled Wood certified materials, or by conducting the control themselves. However, the last option is only useful for companies which can trace the input back to forest level, and this is not the case for companies further down in the supply chain, such as printing houses.

Considering this, such companies will effectively need to start sourcing FSC certified or FSC Controlled Wood certified paper only. This will probably be difficult in short term, while we expect that the availability of such materials will increase in thelonger term due to demands from e.g. printers for controlled wood certified materials.

Minor parts

The new FSC CoC standard allows minor components with non-controlled origin to be used (up to 1% and up to 5% in case special procedures are followed and approval is gained from FSC). This may be helpful for some printers in case very minor parts of the printed material (e.g. promotional sheet between a book) are from non-certified material. See related article about minor components.

Further information

Please consult the links and documents listed below for further guidance. You are also very welcome to contact us with any question you might have related to the controlled wood requirements.

Please consult the links and documents listed below for further guidance. You are also very welcome to contact us with any question you might have related to the controlled wood requirements.