Keurhout admits the SGS-TLTV-VLO system to Keurhout-Legal!         

June, 1st, 2010       

Background
In the summer 2008 the Keurhout Board of Experts (BoE) had admitted the Timber Legality & Traceability Verification (TLTV) System of SGS to its Keurhout-Legal System. The TLTV Programme was the first legality system ever to be admitted to the Keurhout-Legal System.

The TLTV Programme is a verification service by SGS which is designed to verify that timber has been legally produced, acquired and sold by a particular forestry or timber company. The legality-verified timber is traced throughout the supply chain.

Until 2008 the TLTV verifications confirmed full legal compliance according to nine principles of the TLTV Standard in one step. By the end of 2008 SGS introduced a phased approach for the TLTV System whereby clients could choose to achieve full legal compliance in two steps: successful audits against the first four legality principles of the TLTV Standard would verify the TLTV-VLO (Verified Legal Origin) stage, and compliance against four additional principles the TLTV-VLC (Verified Legal Compliance = full legal compliance) stage. Both stages comprise a traceability principle for the Chain-of-Custody (CoC).

As the admittance to the Keurhout-Legal System related to the full legal compliance stage only, Keurhout participants and SGS applied for an evaluation of the VLO component against the Keurhout Legal criteria in 2009.

Admission of TLTV-VLO
In September 2009 an adjustment process of the TLTV VLO Standard began with the objective to meet the requirements of the KH-Legal criteria. It was finalized with the establishment of a revised VLO standard on March 22nd 2010. Between April and June 2010 the BoE undertook a validation study of the TLTV-VLO system, which resulted in the admission of SGS TLTV-VLO to the Keurhout Legal System as per June 10th 2010.

The admission of TLTV-VLO to the Keurhout-Legal System has a validity of 5 years and concerns the entire TLTV-VLO System. It must be pointed out however, that the admission is based on the requirements of the TLTV-VLO Standard dated 22/03/2010. This means that only verification statements (certificates) issued against this new standard (or later versions) are valid as KH-Legal.
To bring existing VLO clients in compliance with the new criteria, SGS will carry out VLO surveillance audits against the 2010 Standard and issue new TLTV-VLO Verification Statements.
The factual admission of specific TLTV-VLO-verified parties to the KH-Legal System is therefore expected to take place until the end of this year on a case by case basis (as soon as a new TLTV-statement has been issued by SGS).

SGS’ latest development, a TLTV group verification system, has not been admitted to KH-Legal yet since it is still in the pilot project phase; it will be assessed separately as soon as relevant.

To date the SGS-TLTV-VLO System covers well over 2.6 million ha of forest, divided over 11 VLO statements in 3 countries (Malaysia, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea). The chain of custody (CoC) actually comprises 12 statements in producer and trading countries (Australia, Malaysia and Indonesia).

The above means a significant addition both in total admitted area, as in admitted number of CoC certificate holders to Keurhout Legal. The total certified area covered under Keurhout-Legal so far amounts to 9,6 million ha, whereas the total admitted number of CoC holders is well over 150.
As a result not only the volume of Keurhout-Legal timber will be increased, but also the volume of Keurhout-Sustainable timber level 2 (of which up to 30 % may consist of Keurhout-Legal timber).

All timber processing companies with a TLTV-VLO statement are properly controlled and in compliance with the TLTV-VLO requirements which aim at assuring that timber from controversial sources is excluded. Timber from third party sources is controlled according to SGS requirements for legal origin. SGS verifies compliance with those conditions at least annually.

Admitted exporting companies in producer countries may request permission to use the Keurhout-Legal logo on-product, in line with the procedures as detailed in the Keurhout-Logo Use Guide.

Information on SGS:
SGS is an international company that specialises in independent testing, inspection, verification and certification. SGS is a well-known and accredited Certification Body, also in the field of forestry. For sustainable forest management SGS developed the SGS Qualifor Program, which is FSC accredited.

SmartWood issues first VLO and VLC certificates against the KH-Legal admitted standards!            

June, 1st, 2010

Per January 25th 2010 the Keurhout Board of Experts (BoE) admitted the VLO and VLC Systems of SmartWood/Rainforest Alliance (SW/RA) to its Keurhout-Legal system. The RA is an international non-profit conservation organisation working in the field of sustainable forestry, agriculture, tourism and education  Through independent auditing, certification and the promotion of certified products, the Rainforest Alliance works to conserve biodiversity and ensure sustainable livelihoods by transforming land-use practices, business practices and consumer behaviour.

The SmartWood program also offers services for legality verification: Verification of Legal Origin (VLO) and Verification of Legal Compliance (VLC). Both standards consist of two components: a) the forest management component, which verifies a certain level of legal conformance of forest products and; b) the CoC component, which verifies the presence and appropriateness of a timber tracking system from the source until the final product.

The VLO system has been designed to verify that timber comes from a source that has a documented legal right to harvest, pursuant to the laws and regulations of the government of the jurisdiction, while forest management complies with essential legal regulations. Suppliers of VLO timber must follow and maintain documented CoC systems. The VLO timber is traced and verified throughout the supply chain. The VLO system became operational in November 2007; so far approximately 1,8 million ha are covered, involving over 15 VLO Verification Statements (certificates) in 4 countries (Malaysia, China, Philippines and Indonesia). New verification processes are in progress in Laos, Honduras and Brazil. The KH-Legal admission of the VLO system relates to the new VLO standard dated 18/01/10. As indicated earlier, only verification statements (certificates) issued against this new standard will be admitted to the Keurhout-Legal system. Keurhout was informed by SW/RA that the first new verification statements have been issued for Malaysia and Indonesia in April 2010. In Malaysia it concerns Carl Ronnow Sdn. Bhd. and a group of related companies, that source their VLO timber from the Yayasan Sabah Group concession (701,868 ha), Sabah. The resulting VLO timber concerns almost 30 species.

In Indonesia PT Karya Guna Ekatama (KAGE) has been issued the first VLO certificate against the new version of the standard; it sources its VLO timber exclusively from the PT Hanurata Unit III in West Papua province (209,670 ha). Timber from KAGE concerns exclusively merbau in a variety of products and can be obtained through KAGE’s agent Costerus Enterprises in Belgium.

The VLC system goes beyond the requirements of VLO: in addition to the legal right to harvest the VLC standard includes a more comprehensive coverage of  applicable national laws and regulations as well as international agreements. VLC is used to assess and verify that producers of timber and/or non-timber forest products (NTFP’s) are in conformance with the VLC standard and laws as applicable to forest harvesting in the country and jurisdiction of operations. In addition the VLC standard includes a CoC system that verifies that all points along the defined supply chain maintain adequate systems to document and control material movement and transformation. The first VLC statements worldwide have been issued on May 25th to Carl Ronnow Sdn. Bhd (multi-site CoC) in combination with the Yayaysan Sabah Group concession (forest management with CoC). The forest area covers part of the group’s concession (FMU’s 15 and 16, which cover an area of 118,520 ha); the resulting VLC timber concerns 8 species, including meranti, seraya, balau, kapur and keruing.

According to SW/RA several other companies are in the process of being audited and/or waiting for issuance of a new certificate for either VLO or VLC. These companies will be mentioned on the Keurhout website as soon as possible.