Motivations, adoption and impact of voluntary environmental certification in the Italian Forest based industry: The case of the FSC standard

Galati, Antonino; Gianguzzi, Giuseppe; Tinervia, Salvatore; Crescimanno, Maria; Veca, Donato Salvatore La Mela

doi:10.1016/j.forpol.2017.08.002

Cited by 52 publications

(50 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…Thus, the certified owners in particular understand certification as a tool for presenting their improved forest management practices and, consequently, developing their environmental performance [24,34,35,37,41,42,44,45]. On the other hand, neither the certified nor non-certified forest owners consider the economic role of certification to be an important one.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Decisions to participate in certification programmes can be positively influenced by a number of different factors, for example, receiving professional advice or having a written management or stewardship plan [22], market pressure, land-ownership pattern, and water-body abundance [23]. Galati et al [24] argue that influence of internal drivers to adopt voluntary certification linked to a pro-environmental behaviour of owners and managers, such as a signalling mechanism and moral and ethical reasons, is more important than economic or market incentives. Empirical results by Nakamura et al [25] and Takahashi [26] revealed that the market economic and social models explained participation in forest certification.…”

Section: Forest Certification and Sustainabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Understanding Sustainable Forest Management Certification in Slovakia: Forest Owners’ Perception of Expectations, Benefits and Problems

et al. 2018

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Forest certification as a voluntary verification tool has been providing an independent assessment of sustainable forestry practices and thus confidence in sustainability benchmarks for over 20 years. Using either the international or national approaches and initiatives, two main forest certification systems, PEFC (Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification) and FSC (Forest Stewardship Council), have spread in a number of countries worldwide. The specifics of local conditions in the forestry sector have to be taken into account when implementing the certification context in a given country or a region. Apart from the natural conditions, institutional structure, or legislative framework, it is also the local and national stakeholders and their perception of this issue that provides the background for the implementation of the certification criteria. The main objective of this study is to examine the general understanding of the certification concept as an environmental, economic, and social tool, and to determine the incentives of forest owners in Slovakia for sustainable forest management (SFM) certification. In addition, the benefits and problems arising from participation in certification were identified and differences reflecting the ownership structure of forests, size of forest area, and participation in a particular certification programme were analysed. Results indicate that certified forest owners, unlike non-certified, demonstrated a high level of understanding of the SFM certification concept. Certified entities mainly consider forest certification as their commitment to environmental responsibility and a tool for improving external company image, promoting sustainable utilisation of forest resources, and improving forest management practices. The main benefits are linked to the possibility to demonstrate forest management practices, a better understanding of the forest management concept, and improvement of forest management practices. PEFC users perceive more benefits following from certification; the most important are those associated with non-economic values, while FSC-certified forest owners perceive mainly economic benefits connected to market penetration, increased sales volume, and potential price premiums. The key problems associated with certification relate to duties to ensure compliance with certification criteria by contractors and administrative difficulties. Respondents reported minimum price premiums for the sale of their certified timber. Additionally, the findings of the study pointed out that a nationally developed certification system can better recognise the roles and objectives of forest certification in the context of forest policy.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Forest Certification and Sustainabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Understanding Sustainable Forest Management Certification in Slovakia: Forest Owners’ Perception of Expectations, Benefits and Problems

et al. 2018

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“…Thus, SFM certification was introduced in the early 1990s as a voluntary mechanism, to alleviate the consequences of deforestation and forest degradation and to promote the maintenance of biological diversity, especially in the tropics [4]. Forest management (FM) certification was widely accepted all around the world as an innovative policy instrument for operationalizing the concept of SFM [1,5], and has directly influenced FM practices and forest conservation [6][7][8][9][10].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Several studies analysed FSC's advantages and success or limitations and barriers [14][15][16][17], legitimacy [18], forest governance improvements [12,19,20], accountability [21], effectiveness [22], as well as consumers and private forest owners' perceptions and demands [7,[23][24][25]. Moreover, studies have also analysed the reasons why forest companies are changing their practices to comply with FSC standards [7] and investigated the reasons for selecting a particular forest certification scheme [26]. However, others have focused on the impacts of FSC forest certification on FM [27], business performance [9,20,[27][28][29][30][31] and ecosystem services [32][33][34] or studied the differences in FM practices between certified and non-certified forests [35].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Contribution of Forest Stewardship Council Certification to Sustainable Forest Management of State Forests in Selected Southeast European Countries

Malovrh

Bećirović

Marić

et al. 2019

Forests

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In recent decades, the concept of forest certification under the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) has been widely adopted in selected Southeast European countries (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Serbia, and Slovenia). As sustainability is traditionally recognised as a leading principle in the forest management doctrine in these countries, the aim of this study was to understand whether, and how, FSC forest certification contributes to the sustainable management of state forests. The research was carried out in two phases. First, in order to assess forest management compliance with FSC standard, non-conformities for the period 2014–2018, identified in audit Public Summary Reports, were analysed in all public companies that managed state-owned forests in selected countries. Further, in-depth, semi-structured interviews with the professionals responsible for forest certification in these companies were conducted (n = 11) to determine the contribution of forest certification to the economic, ecological, and social aspects of sustainable forest management. In total, 185 non-conformities were analysed. The results showed that FSC certification was successful in addressing certain problems in forest management practices and contributed to sustainable forest management, mainly covering social and ecological issues. The most frequently identified non-conformities were those related to FSC Principle 4 Community relations and worker’s rights (32.3% of all non-conformities) and Principle 6 Environmental impact (30.4% of all non-conformities). The contribution of FSC certification to sustainable forest management is mainly reflected in the following aspects: Worker’s rights; health and safety of employees; availability of appropriate personal protective equipment; consultation with local people and interest groups; awareness of environmental impacts of forestry operations; waste disposal and storage of fuel; improving the image of forest companies and maintenance of high-conservation-value forests. The majority of non-conformities were minor and required procedural changes to be closed. Moreover, there are no statistically significant differences between the countries with regard to the number of non-conformities for all principles. It can be concluded that FSC certification, as a market-driven mechanism, plays an important role by influencing forest management practices and business operations of public forest companies in a positive manner.

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Seeing the trees for the forest: Adoption dynamics of the Forest Stewardship Council

Depoorter

Marx

2022

Applied Eco Perspectives Pol

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The integration of voluntary sustainability standards (VSS) into public policy (i.e., their institutionalization) is generally considered a driver for their adoption. However, although the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), a leading VSS in forest governance, has been increasingly institutionalized, its adoption has been stagnating recently. To understand what drives this stagnation, we analyze the adoption of FSC certification globally and at the country level over a 20-year period. We show that the global stagnation in FSC adoption hides distinct adoption dynamics at country level. We highlight three types of country-level adoption dynamics: stagnation, growth, and decline. Based on selected descriptive country case studies, we explore factors driving these dynamics, with a focus on the role of governments and competition with other VSS.

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Motivations, adoption and impact of voluntary environmental certification in the Italian Forest based industry: The case of the FSC standard

Cited by 52 publications

References 34 publications

Understanding Sustainable Forest Management Certification in Slovakia: Forest Owners’ Perception of Expectations, Benefits and Problems

Understanding Sustainable Forest Management Certification in Slovakia: Forest Owners’ Perception of Expectations, Benefits and Problems

Contribution of Forest Stewardship Council Certification to Sustainable Forest Management of State Forests in Selected Southeast European Countries

Seeing the trees for the forest: Adoption dynamics of the Forest Stewardship Council

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