CPET activities

The key activity for May has been the reassessment of the forest certification schemes FSC, PEFC, CSA, SFI and MTCC. CPET has been collating the most up-to-date information relevant to compliance with each CPET criterion. In mid May we publicly announced the review of the schemes and invited stakeholders to comment on the schemes. Read more about the Category A assessment in the article Certification schemes are being reviewed for continued compliance with the government’s criteria for legality and sustainability.

The CPET helpline has received several enquiries from furniture suppliers on how to provide the right evidence of compliance with the UK Government's timber procurement policy. These enquiries are all related the launch of the re-tendering of OGC’s Executive Agency Buying Solutions’ Furniture Framework Agreement. For more information, see the article Implementation of the UK Government’s Timber Procurement Policy... where we look at the OGCbuying.solutions Furniture Framework Agreement as an example.

The common framework which we have developed in cooperation with the Netherlands, Denmark and Belgium has now been finalised and compares the four countries criteria for legality and sustainability. CPET has also produced a summary report highlighting the similarities and differences of the policies and the criteria. The findings will be presented at the Chatham House Illegal Logging Stakeholder Meeting on the 10^th of June. In addition the comparative study will also provide the basis for a joint presentation at the Workshop on public procurement policy for wood and wood-based products in Brussels on June 13. The intention is to share experiences with other EU member states which have not yet developed or are in the progress of developing, a timber procurement policy and to give other Member States an understanding of the key components of a public procurement policy for timber and the criteria set for legality and sustainability.

Next month’s news letter will include important updates on the UK Governments policy.

If you have colleagues or contractors who need to be up to speed with the UK Government’s timber procurement policy, let them know about the CPET Newsletter and the CPET services.