Chain of Custody Standard

SFI chain-of-custody is a standard that tracks percentages of certified forest content, certified sourcing material, and post-consumer recycled content. Any organization that processes or trades SFI-certified forest products is eligible to seek SFI chain-of-custody certification. This includes manufacturers of forest products, paper merchants, converters, wood dealers, wood yards, wholesalers, brokers and printers. To achieve SFI chain-of-custody certification, the organization must have processes in place to track the source of its raw materials, such as inventory control, employee training, reporting and invoicing, and meet the requirements in the SFI Chain-of-Custody Standard. Chain of custody is a means to assure the marketplace that the claims organizations make are credible and transparent.

The SFI program has three certified chain-of-custody labels, each indicating that a chain of custody has been third party certified. The CoC labels vary depending on whether a percentage based or a credit based method was used to calculate certified forest content flows.

Family Forest Owners Provide Public Benefits

Nationally, about 10 million family forest owners manage more than half of privately owned forestlands. A portion of the raw materials utilized by SFI Program Participants are supplied by family landowners who participate in the American Tree Farm System (ATFS) program. As Chuck Leavell says, SFI “brings wood from ATFS-certified forests to markets.”

SFI recognizes ATFS certification, which applies to some 83,000 U.S. small landowners, representing 26 million acres of certified forestland. Among these small family forest landowners is Earl and Wanda Barrs, Owners of Gully Branch Tree Farm in Bleckly County, Georgia. The Barrs sum it up best when they say, “Across the country, families and individuals own more of America's forestland than any other group, including the federal government or industry. In Georgia, families own more than half of the forestland in the state, and 70 percent of the wood used by industry comes from family forest owners like us. These families play a key role in providing jobs and economic vitality for rural communities.”

First Nations and Native Tribes Look to SFI Certification

More than 5 million acres of lands held by or managed for indigenous communities have been certified to the SFI forest management standard. The effort recognizes how first nations and native tribes in North America rely on forests to meet material life needs as well as to support cultural and spiritual traditions. “The SFI standard reinforces many of the objectives we currently have in managing our forests—protecting special sites, conservation, and community involvement,” said Chief Lorraine Cobiness, president of the Miitigoog, a partnership of indigenous communities, logging companies and forest product mills based in the Kenora Forest area of Ontario, Canada. With land holdings of about 2.8 million acres, the alliance is represented by the Wabaseemoong Independent Nation, Naotkamegwanning First Nation, and the Ochiichagwe'Babigo'Ining Ojibway Nation.

“We found that a lot of the SFI principles matched the objectives and goals of First Nations communities for long-term management of their land base,” says Corby Lamb, president of Capacity Forest Management, which manages forest tenures for First Nations companies across British Columbia.

Aboriginal Groups Partner with SFI Certified Organizations

The Nanwakolas Council—a leadership group for 12 First Nations along British Columbia’s Pacific Coast—has partnered with International Forest Products Ltd., to develop standards for cedar trees suitable for carving traditional canoes, poles and big houses, and to create an inventory. To ensure that there are enough of the trees to meet at least 300 years of future need for the tribal nations, the group first produced a field card identifying the qualities of an “ideal tree:” 300 to 600 years old, with no knots, tight rings, a well-tapered trunk and a size of more than 3 feet in diameter. Then the locations of candidate trees were catalogued using GPS.