The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) has launched the Indian Forest and Wood Certification Scheme (IFWCS) to encourage sustainable forest management and agroforestry in India by offering voluntary third-party certification.
About the Indian Forest and Wood Certification Scheme:
IFWCS is governed by the Indian Forest and Wood Certification Council (IFWCC) and operated by the Indian Institute of Forest Management (IIFM) in Bhopal(Madhya Pradesh) as the designated Scheme Operating Agency (SOA).
- The National Accreditation Board for Certification Bodies(NABCB) under the Quality Council of India will be responsible for conducting independent audits through accredited CBs(Certification Bodies), to assess the adherence of various organisations is aligned with the standards of the IFWS scheme
Key Points:
i.The scheme has three main components:
- Forest Management Certification
- Tree Outside Forest(TOF) Management Certification
- Chain of Custody(COC) Certification
ii.The scheme offers market incentives to various institutions or organizations that follow responsible forest management and agroforestry practices in their operations.
Eligible entities:
The scheme includes individual farmers or Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs), state forest departments engaged in agroforestry and farm forestry and other wood-based industries in the value chain.
Applicability:
The scheme is applicable both in forest areas and Trees Outside Forests (TOFs) plantations on government, private, agroforestry and other lands. Also, it is applicable for timber and Non-Timber Forest Produce (NTFP).
Forest Management Certification Scheme:
It is based on the Indian Forest Management Standard (IFMS) which includes: 8 criteria, 69 indicators and 254 verifiers. IFMS is the core part of the National Working Plan Code 2023.
- Forest Certification is referred to as the environmental label (ECOMARK) for sustainable forest management practices. It provides opportunities to gain Green credits for additional activities such as afforestation, water harvesting and the production of timber.
TOF Management Certification:
It is the certification of TOF areas, which have proper management plans and policies that are by the standards of IFWCS and duly approved by IFWCC regularly.
- TOFs are important for economic, environmental and social sustainability, including supply chains.
- TOFs means trees growing outside recorded and notified forests, in agricultural lands of individual farmers/groups of small farmers/ plantation areas on private land of organisations and industries.
- It also includes trees on the hedges and bunds, urban and rural forestry systems and block plantations.
Chain of Custody (COC) Certification:
It is the certification of the unbroken path taken by products (such as timber or Non-Timber Forest Produce (NTFP) from the forests to the place where the product is sold with an IFWS approval and then, converted into a finished product such as paper, furniture, handicrafts, wood panels, herbal products that are IFWCS labelled according to the IFWCS COC standard.
- It allows entities to provide reliable and accurate information that forest and tree-based products are sourced from IFWCS-certified forests/TOFs/Plantations.
- The primary objective of describing the origin of forest and tree-based products is to promote demand and supply from sustainably managed forests.
About IFWCC:
IFWCC will act as a multistakeholder advisory body, responsible for monitoring the Indian Forest and Wood Certification scheme.
- Additional Director General of Forest will act as chairman of IFWCC.
- Other members: It will have representatives from the Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education(ICFRE), Forest Survey of India(FSI), Quality Council of India(QCI), and IIFM.
About Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC):
Union Minister– Bhupendra Yadav(Rajya Sabha- Rajasthan)
Minister of State– Ashwini Kumar Choubey(Constituency- Buxar, Bihar)
