The importance of people & forests in tackling climate change
Bringing together forestry experts to focus on how we can support forest owners to implement sustainable management practices and achieve certification.
The importance of people & forests in tackling climate change
25 November 2015 News
As the world’s international community moves its attention to the 2015 Paris Climate Conference (COP21), PEFC highlights the important role that forests and people together can take in combating climate change and tackling deforestation.
During this vital conference on climate change, PEFC International and PEFC Spain are bringing together forestry experts from over twenty countries for a special field dialogue on “People, Forests and Climate Change”, focusing on how we can support forest owners to implement sustainable management practices and achieve certification.
With 30% of the global forest area managed by small-forest owners, communities and indigenous peoples, it is imperative that forest certification is not a barrier to market integration. In many countries, the only way to ensure that forest owners have access to forest certification is through group certification.
PEFC developed Group Certification over a decade ago to enable groups of small forest landholders to pool their resources and work together to achieve third-party verified sustainable forest management. Thanks to this, there are now hundreds of thousands of PEFC-certified small-forest owners around the world.
“PEFC was founded by small- and family forest owners, and as a result Group Certification is at the heart of our organization,” said Ben Gunneberg, CEO of PEFC International. “By providing these smallholders with the opportunity to achieve certification we can help to facilitate rural development, reduce poverty, optimize the contribution of forestry to the green economy and combat climate change.”
Taking place in Madrid and Coca, Spain, on the 2 to 4 December, this special field dialogue is designed so that participants can share solutions and support each other in the design of group certification models tailored to each region. Participants will also be introduced the different working models of group certification, such as regional forest management certification - similar to jurisdictional approaches and landscape certification concepts.
The event provides an excellent opportunity for those countries currently developing a national forest certification system to find out more about the group certification mechanism. Representatives from countries across the globe are expected to attend, including: Cameroon, Guatemala, India, Laos, Nepal, New Zealand, Philippines, South Africa, Thailand, United Kingdom and Viet Nam.