The Concept of Criteria and Indicators in Sustainable Forestry

Sustainable forestry is a sub-set of the larger sustainability question. For the purposes of developing an assessment system, CIFOR has defined sustainable forest management as:

"a set of objectives and outcomes consistent with maintaining or improving the forest’s ecological integrity and contributing to people’s well-being both now and in the future."

This definition represents what CIFOR sees as the common denominator in other definitions of sustainable forest management that it has examined. A system to evaluate the sustainability of forest management will need to assess the following two conditions which represent the bio-physical, social and temporal elements of sustainability:

1. Ecological integrity is maintained or enhanced.

2. Well-being of people is maintained or enhanced.

Fulfillment of the two conditions is expected to take place continuously over long but not indefinite periods of time. It is recognized that there may be short-term and site-specific conflicts between these two goals and the determination of the appropriate balance is likely to be a problem for assessors.

In June 1992, the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development met in Rio de Janeiro. The Conference reaffirmed the Declaration of the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment (adopted in Stockholm in June 1972) and sought to build upon it. The goal of the Conference was to establish a new and equitable global partnership through the creation of new levels of cooperation among countries, key sectors of societies and people. The objective was to work towards international agreements which respect the interests of all people and protect the integrity of the global environmental and development system.

The first principle of the Conference was:

"Human beings are at the center of concerns for sustainable development. They are entitled to a healthy and productive life in harmony with nature."

Additional principles:

• hold up the right for peoples to fulfill development in order to equitably meet developmental and environmental needs of present and future generations;
• cooperation among states in eradicating poverty;
• involvement of people in decision making;
• education;
• compensation for pollution;
• application of the precautionary approach by states in addressing environmental problems;
• use of environmental impact statements;
• recognition of the vital role of women and indigenous peoples in environmental management and development;
• opening of international economic systems; and,
• the inclusion of environmental protection as an integral part of the development process.

All of these principles were seen as essential to the realization of sustainable development.

Agenda 21, the operational report which arose from the Rio Conference, called for "a substantial flow of new and additional financial resources to developing countries, in order to cover the incremental costs for the actions they have to undertake to deal with global environmental problems and to accelerate sustainable development". The implementation of the Agenda was seen as the beginning of a new global partnership for sustainable development.

The Agenda 21 report also presented a set of non-legally binding authoritative principles for a global consensus on the management, conservation and sustainable development of all types of forests. The set of principles were intended to contribute to the management, conservation and sustainable development of forests and to provide for their multiple and complementary functions and uses. The principles:

• reaffirmed the sovereign rights of states to exploit their own resources pursuant to their own environmental policies and have the responsibility to ensure that activities within their jurisdiction or control do not cause damage to the environment of other states;
• emphasized the need for timely, reliable and accurate information on the forests and their ecosystems in order to educate the public and make informed management decisions;
• called for provisions to increased the involvement of various peoples in the implementation and planning of national forest policies;
• recognized of the vital role of forests in maintaining ecological processes;
• recognized that national forest policies should recognize and support the identity, culture and rights of indigenous people and forest dwellers;
• recognized the vital role of women;
• recognized the need for plantations of both indigenous and introduced species for the provision of both fuel and industrial wood;
• supported efforts to promote an international economic climate conducive to sustained and environmentally sound development of forests in all countries;
• supported efforts to "green the world" through reforestation, afforestation and forest conservation;
• called for support of developing countries striving to strengthen their management, conservation and sustainable development situations;
• called for strengthening of scientific research, forest inventories and assessments;
• called for open and free international trade in forest products; and,
• called for control of pollutants that are harmful to the health of forest ecosystems at all geopolitical scales.

The Montreal Process and Santiago Declaration

Following the Rio Conference, Canada convened an International Seminar of Experts on Sustainable Development of Boreal and Temperate Forests. The seminar, held in Montreal, Canada, in September 1993 focussed specifically on the development of criteria and indicators for the sustainable management of temperate and boreal forests and provided the conceptual basis for subsequent regional and international work on criteria and indicators (C&I).

The initiative led to the formation of the Working Group on Criteria and Indicators for the Conservation and Sustainable Management of Temperate and Boreal Forests ("Montreal Process") which was formed in Geneva in June 1994 to advance the development of internationally agreed criteria and indicators for the conservation and sustainable management of temperate and boreal forests at the national level. Participants included Australia, Canada, Chile, China, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Mexico, New Zealand, the Russian Federation and the United States of America. These countries cover five continents and together represent over 90 per cent of the world's temperate and boreal forests (as well as areas of tropical forests) and about 60 per cent of the world's forests. They also account for 45 per cent of the world trade in wood and wood products and 35 per cent of the world's population. Several international organizations, non-governmental organizations and other countries also participated in meetings of the Working Group.

The Montreal Process Working Group was established with the specific purpose of developing and implementing internationally agreed C&I for sustainable forest management. The group has developed a comprehensive set of 7 criteria and 67 indicators for the conservation and sustainable management of temperate and boreal forests.

In February 1995 in Santiago, Chile, the Working Group countries endorsed a comprehensive set of criteria and indicators for forest conservation and sustainable management for use by their respective policy-makers. These criteria and indicators, together with the statement of endorsement are known as the "Santiago Declaration". Argentina and Uruguay have since endorsed the Declaration.

The C&I provide a common understanding of what is meant by sustainable forest management. The first six criteria deal specifically with forest conditions, attributes or functions, and the values or benefits associated with the environmental and socioeconomic goods and services that forests provide. The seventh criterion relates to the overall policy framework of a country that can facilitate the conservation and sustainable management of forests.

The criteria and indicators are tools for assessing national trends in forest conditions and management, and provide a common framework for describing, monitoring and evaluating progress towards sustainability at the country level.

Application of the criteria and indicators are intended to help:

• provide an international reference for policy makers in the formulation of national policies,
• improve the quality of information available to decision makers and the public,
• better inform the forest policy debate at national and international levels, and
• provide an agreed framework for data collection and reporting that will provide a clearer picture of forest management performance and remove duplication in reporting standards.

The criteria and indicators could also help provide a basis for international cooperation in support of sustainable forest management.

Concepts of the conservation and sustainable management of forests are continually evolving and the Montreal Process C&I are intended to be reviewed and adjusted as appropriate to reflect:

• improvements in scientific knowledge as to how forest ecosystems function and respond to human interventions;
• increased experience in and capability to measure indicators,
• advances in technology;
• changing public demands for forest products and services; and,
• improved definition of indicators that measure significant and useful aspects of sustainability of forest management.

Application of Sustainable Forestry

Forest management has been traditionally polarized by a utilization vs. preservationists perspective. Approaches to sustainable forestry appear to seek a balance between maintaining essential biological processes and keeping economic benefits flowing from the forest resource.

In the process of domesticating forests, humans have also domesticated certain of its component species. This results in a simplification of the forest structure. The loss of species diversity and of genetic variability within species can lead to a loss of resilience to change or disturbance. To retain resilience, it is important to conserve both the diversity of the biological information and the diversity of human information (i.e. knowledge of the processes, use and management of forests and associated cultural traditions). It is also important to avoid or mitigate gross changes which provoke instability (e.g. social and economic problems which force people into the forest; infrastructures or policies which attract people to the forest; policy and economic signals which undervalue forest resources, encourage speculation and render investments risky)(Sargent and Bass, 1992).

Sargent and Bass (1992) suggest that sustainable forestry can be achieved through:

i) maintaining the harvest of all products at sustainable levels (i.e. by careful control of harvesting levels, timing and frequency, and by minimizing harvesting damage to residual stock; monitoring and feedback into silvicultural management)

ii) maintaining essential ecosystem processes (i.e. by retaining continuous vegetation cover; returning nutrients to the soil; minimizing soil compaction; maintaining watercourse patterns; careful control of chemical use)

iii) maintaining biological diversity at ecosystem, species and gene levels (i.e. by adopting multi-species/variety/clone systems wherever feasible; incorporating secondary succession as far as possible, rather then treating it as a weed problem; integrated pest management)

iv) satisfying the needs of people living in and around the forest (i.e. by involving local people at all stages in forest boundary definition, planning, management, harvesting and monitoring of the forest, and forest product processing; employing local people; compensating for rights and privileges forgone; providing access and user rights; providing recreational facilities; ensuring landscape and cultural compatibility)

v) ensuring economic sustainability (i.e. (1) on the part of the forest user, through investing in processes that minimize external inputs of materials and energy, that recycle and that reduce waste and especially turn ‘waste’ into products; and through investment in forestry research, species/provenance selection and breeding; and (2) on the part of governments, creating conditions that will ensure that forest users stay in business but do not reap an excessive proportion of forest rent (Poor and Sayer (1987) cited in Sargent and Bass (1992)).

Sustainable Forestry Initiatives in North America

In addition to the Montreal process, there are many sustainable forestry initiatives ongoing in North American including government, industry and environmental non-government organizations. Some of these efforts are aimed at certification of forest products and others deal with more general sustainability goals. It is not possible to discuss all the initiatives in this report. However we wanted to acknowledge the vast amount of effort in this area. It should be noted that this North American test did not take any position on, or explicitly evaluate, the efforts discussed below

Examples from industry include The Sustainable Forestry Initiative of the American Forest and Paper Association (AF&PA), which has been adopted by commercial forestry operators in Idaho. The Sustainable Forestry Initiative views sustainable forestry as the practice of a land stewardship ethic which integrates the reforestation, managing, growing, nurturing, and harvesting of trees for useful products with the conservation of soil, air and water quality, wildlife and fish habitat, and aesthetics. Reforestation following tree harvest is seen as the cornerstone of forest sustainability and thus the priority of forest management is to establish new stands of trees. The AF&PA is promoting this stewardship ethic among private forest landowners and loggers. Member companies are committed to reforest their forestlands within two years of a final harvest by planting or direct seeding, or within five years using planned natural regeneration (American Forest and Paper Association, 1998).

An example from the government sector is the Model Forest Program. Canada, United States and Mexico have areas which have been included as part of the International Model Forest Program. A Model Forest is a Canadian-initiated program, conceived as a diverse partnership of stakeholders and rights holders working toward sustainable forest management. The program aims to be a large-scale working model of sustainable forest management and working sites for developing and applying new knowledge and technologies. In the Canadian Model forest program there are 10 individual sites field testing criteria and indicators of sustainable forestry.