Mission, BC—Mission Municipal Forest has recently achieved third-party forest certification under the Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI), SFI Indigenous Peoples and Families Module.
‘We are extremely pleased to be certified under the SFI system – this gives both our citizens and timber buyers confidence that we are managing the Mission Municipal Forest in a sustainable fashion. The City of Mission is committed to continually improving how we manage forests around the community, and we are working on implementing a number of new, progressive initiatives over the next few years with this in mind,” said Chris Gruenwald, Director of Forestry.
The Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI) Inc. is an independent non-profit organization dedicated to promoting sustainable forest management in the United States and Canada. It is responsible for maintaining the SFI program, which was first launched in 1994 and includes the SFI certification standard. The SFI standard became a national standard backed by third-party audits in 1998.
The SFI Indigenous Peoples and Families Module was created for small-scale forest licences, managed by Indigenous Peoples, Communities, and Families. Management under this standard is based on 13 principles, including:
- Sustainable Forestry
- Forest Productivity and Health
- Protection of Water Resources
- Protection of Biological Diversity
- Aesthetics and Recreation
- Protection of Special Sites
- Legal Compliance
- Research
- Training and Education
- Community Involvement and Social Responsibility, and Respect for Indigenous Rights
- Transparency
- Continual Improvement
- Responsible Fiber Sourcing
For more information on the SFI Program, please visit https://forests.org/