FOREST CERTIFICATION IN MALAYSIA

GAYATHRI S. ABHAYARATHNE

The aim of forest certification is to prove the buyer of timber products that the timber used for them is derived from a well managed forest. This is proved by the certification of the forest management on the one hand and the chain of custody of timber on the other hand and is made visible by the appropriate label on the product or its package. The purpose of this is to prove that the forest management has a sustainable basis in line with the decisions of the UN’s environmental summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. According to this, sustainable development or forest management includes ecological, social and economical sustainability.
International systems as well as national systems can be adopted to certify forests those are in conformity with the internationally accepted standards and criteria. Mainly Forest Stewardship Council
(FSC) certification and Pan European Forest Certification (PEFC) act as mostly recognized international systems while there are some countries who have adopted their own systems in a way that their standards and criteria are fulfilling their requirements. Malaysia is one of them, where their national forest certification system works more effectively.
77,542 ha out of 19,292,000 ha of total forests have been certified in Malaysia under FSC. It is around 0.4% of total forested area. After the International Tropical Timber Agreement (ITTA) in 1997, the needness of adopting their own certification system took an importance when the condition came that "all timber producer countries have to have their exports of tropical timber and tropical timber products come from sustainably managed sources by the year 2000".
As a result of this, Malaysian Timber Certification Council (MTCC) was established to formulate Malaysian indicators and criteria (MC&I) and started its operation in October 2001 which will issue forest certification for those who are meeting the seven criteria and fifty three indicators that have adopted by them. Certificates for forest management as well as certificate for chain of custody are issued by the MTCC. When consider about the percentage of areas certified under FSC and MTCC, in Malaysia 11% and 89% of area have been certified under two systems respectively.
First shipment of MTCC certified timber has been carried away in July 2002. According to reports, the exports of MTCC certified timber has been increased with the time. Although the forest certification in Malaysia is successfully implementing due to the adaptation of own forest certification scheme and the independent monitoring and engagement of government, the future demand on MTCC certified timber is under uncertainty, as a result of the slow rate of acceptance in the world market due to locally adopted nature.
If the countries looking forward to buy the certified timber from other countries accept and support MTCC certified timber in near future, the uncertainty in demand can be minimized and so then the future for MTCC certified timber will be more favorable to Malaysia.