Thailand announces their application to PEFC for membership and we highlight the opportunities of certification in Asia and beyond – Asian Paper Bangkok 2016 was a busy few days!
“Accelerating demand for legal and sustainable timber represents both opportunities and challenges for the world's forest's, specifically in Asia,” said Ben Gunneberg, CEO of PEFC International, as he spoke at the Certification, Environment and Sustainability session on the first day of Asian Paper.
“Certification must adapt to the constantly shifting sands of needs of people. We need to ensure that sustainable forest management equally balances the environmental, social and economic pillars of sustainability, we need to find common ground between global demand side requirements and local supply side expectations," Mr. Gunneberg explained.
"By working through a bottom-up approach, by convening all interested parties at both national and international levels in ongoing dialogues, PEFC is well placed to build a bridge between local and global and to advance an understanding of sustainability that we all can feel comfortable with," Mr. Gunneberg highlighted.
Alongside Ben’s ‘fireside chat’ with other forestry experts to address sustainable forestry, realizing dollars and the value of sustainability, we also had our PEFC booth at the heart of the Asian Paper to provide information, initiate debate and raise awareness throughout the two day conference.
Spotlight on Thailand.
With so much progress under foot in Thailand towards enhancing the legal and sustainable trade and production in the wood-based and forest sector, PEFC and Federation of Thai Industries (FTI) co-hosted a special afternoon session within Asian Paper to shine the spotlight on Thailand.
During the event, dozens of stakeholders came together celebrate progress in developing the Thai national certification system and to share perspectives for enhancing the sustainability of the Thai forestry sector through PEFC certification.
“Now that the Thailand Forest Certification Council is officially registered within FTI we have completed all the requirements and look forward to becoming a member of PEFC,” announced Dr. Nihkom, Chair of the TFCC. “Joining PEFC’s international alliance will give Thailand prominence and recognition for all the work we are doing to advance sustainability within our country.”
“I would like to congratulate all the stakeholders who have worked so hard over the past years to achieve this significant step towards the PEFC endorsement of a Thai Forest Certification System,” said Mr. Gunneberg, as he made the announcement. “We look forward to welcoming Thailand as a National member once they have been voted in by our PEFC members.”
The announcement follows an important development on 11 May when the Ministry of Natural Resource and Environment, the Ministry of Industry Thailand, and Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives came together to form the Institute Agro-based Industry (IAI) under FTI. It was acknowledged that the Institute will be responsible for running the Thailand Forest Certification Council.