FSC Wood SSC: Eco-Forestry Up Close

Forests still cover almost a third of the earth's landmass—good news for shade seekers on a hot summer day, especially as 2005 was the warmest year on record in the northern hemisphere. But in the last 200 years, people have cut down some 30 percent of the world's woodlands, according to the World Resources Institute. Can we recoup these vanished forests and save those that remain? As a start, U.S. consumers, who purchase 15 percent of the world's forest products, can jolt retailers into action by demanding lumber from certified well-managed forests.

Welcoming visitors to a forest in the Cowlitz and Chehalis watersheds of southern Washington state, Richard Pine of the O'Neill Pine Company says that he manages these 2,000 acres of Douglas fir, Western red cedar and alder in order to meet shareholder expectations while producing sustainable yields. Six years ago, Pine had his third-generation, family-owned timberland operation certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), which holds him to strict management practices. These include the preservation of habitat and watersheds through less intensive harvesting, reduction of streamside erosion and avoidance of synthetic pesticides. Pine's cost-benefit analysis includes "placing a substantial value on elements that foresters don't conventionally value, like downed wood and snags," which shelter wildlife. Although his forests have no old-growth stands, elk, deer and plenty of songbirds inhabit his woods.

When a load of certified logs leaves Pine's land, it receives a trip ticket that passes from forester to truck driver to mill scaler and finally to lumber mill and retail outlet, maintaining "chain of custody" certification and keeping his FSC lumber separate from non-certified wood. "It's been a real education, and even a bit of a struggle," Pine says.

Evolving Greener Forestry Labels

Pine's efforts, and those of the 4,500 other FSC-certified companies around the world, are definitely worth it. Only a fifth of remaining forests are intact enough to provide habitat for the long-term survival of native plants and animals, according to the World Resources Institute. In addition to the Amazon, we should protect forests of North America's boreal zone, which "make up a quarter of the earth's remaining original forest," according to Scott Weidensaul, a nature writer, in The New York Times. The boreal canopies house "some three billion individuals of nearly 300 species" of birds, Weidensaul writes.