Is forest certification delivering on First Nation issues? The effectiveness of the FSC standard in advancing First Nations' rights in the boreal forests of Ontario and Quebec, Canada

Sara Teitelbaum and Stephen Wyatt

Forest Policy and Economics, 2013, vol. 27, issue C, 23-33

Abstract: Forest certification has become a key driver in efforts towards sustainable forest management. Certification processes include commitments to respect the rights of Aboriginal peoples. However, there has been little investigation into the relationship between certification and Aboriginal rights. This paper examines the effectiveness of certification in addressing a range of First Nation concerns, taking the example of FSC's National Boreal Standard, applied in the provinces of Quebec and Ontario, Canada. This is done through documentary analysis of audit reports for all public land certificates in this region, with particular attention paid to ‘conditions’ (required changes) issued as part of the audit process. Results indicate that 86% of FSC certifications led to at least one condition relating to First Nations' rights, but that most were deemed minor. The two most common issues flagged by conditions were: agreement for the management plan and the evaluation and protection of First Nations' resources and sites. Analysis of subsequent reports revealed that all conditions were resolved within the allotted time period. A qualitative analysis of conditions revealed a tendency for auditors to accept partial conformance when evaluating compliance. We conclude that FSC certification is pushing forest managers to make progress on a wide variety of fronts, but through a lens of ‘continual improvement’ rather than strict conformance with the standard.

Keywords: Forest certification; First Nations; Aboriginal peoples; Indigenous peoples; Sustainable forest management; Boreal forest (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (9)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1389934112002250
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:forpol:v:27:y:2013:i:c:p:23-33

DOI: 10.1016/j.forpol.2012.09.014

Access Statistics for this article

Forest Policy and Economics is currently edited by M. Krott

More articles in Forest Policy and Economics from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().