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Gerlin Ramírez Santana (43), President of Command, speaks with the same calm that reigns in this Amazon Community of Peru where 37 families of the Yagua people live together today.Only the transit of vessels on the Amazon River interrupts that tranquility.Gerlin and their neighbors observe, between January and June of each year, the river transfer of hundreds of trunks of old trees extracted from primary forests and ending up feeding the demand for wood in the main cities of the world of the world.

"I do not know who investments La Oroza is.Is something new for us.You just brought me that name, ”replies Gerlin Ramírez to Eyopúblico.This company, whose concessions are close to command, was involved in the Yacu Kallpa case, the largest illegal wooden seizure that occurred in 2015, when a boat intended to take that merchandise to Mexico and the United States.As a result of this intervention, La Oroza is currently investigated by wood traffic in Peru and has prohibited since 2017 to enter its merchandise to US territory.

But all those background are new to the inhabitants of Command.Further is the existence of an organization that is dedicated to certifying wood, the same product that allows them to subsist in a precarious economy.As with La Oroza, the Yagua people and their neighbors in the communities of Santa Úrsula and San José de Topal, they have still heard of Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), a global organization that emits labels to certify that the wood they useCompanies and agencies is "clean".

Both La Oroza and FSC were protagonists of this key case for illegal wood trade in the Amazon.In September 2021, the Maynas Environmental Prosecutor's Office, in the Amazon region of Loreto, presented, in the frame.In 15 of the 35 folders presented, still without programming of the oral hearings, La Oroza investments, a firm that owns 80% of all the wood seized in 2015.In spite.From an office in Bonn, Germany, the FSC certifier became in recent years a fundamental actor for the commercialization of wood worldwide, which includes theoretically authorized felling operations from the Forests of the Amazon, Africa and Indonesia to the forests ofSiberia.It is an agency composed of environmental activists, environmental civil organizations and companies in the sector that issues certificates that, after an audit process, ensure that the wood produced by a company is sustainable.

SIN INFORMACIÓN. En la comunidad yagua de Comandancia, en Loreto, no saben qué empresas operan en los alrededores de sus territorios y tampoco han oído hablar sobre la certificación FSC.

Foto: OjoPúblico / Marco Garro

The FSC logo, a nice drawing of a green tree, has flooded the labels of hundreds of products in the supermarket gondolas.From a soda, a school notebook or toilet paper to a garden table.That seal has become a shield for large multinational companies that can shout to the world that use wood whose origin does not come from illegal felling or deforestation.Green labels have also become a good business: FSC registered income for US $ 44 million in 2020, according to their own financial balance.The empty of the FSC certifier system, which in many cases has allowed companies to make up wood of illegal origin, aroused concern in recent months between civil organizations and activists.In November 2021, 34 European NGOs demanded urgent structural changes in FSC audits, accused the organization of encouraging deforestation and confusing consumers through the use of different labels.But as it happened in the case of La Oroza, there are several companies that despite having the acronym FSC in their products face research for wood trafficking and have been sanctioned or accused of using wood from illegal logging.Other certified companies have also been denounced for persecuting local inhabitants or accused of agreeing with governments that do not respect human rights.As happened in Peru, cases are repeated in Germany, Russia, Romania, Ukraine and China, among other countries.

"Green certifications are more important than we believe.In rich countries, the authorities look at these stamps and make up with everything is legal.But these labels make false promises to the consumer. Hoy hablamos de la madera, pero mañana muchas otras mercancías que proceden de la deforestación, como la carne vacuna o la soya, también podrían ir acompañadas de estos falsos certificados de sostenibilidad”, dijo a OjoPúblico Tara Ganesh, investigadora de Earthsight.

Earthsight together with other organizations such as Greenpeace and Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) took another step by stating that, with the current certification process, FSC works as a washing machine for wood manufacturers and large brands that use products whose legal origin does notThey can make sure.But the future of the most important wood certifier in the world, a case that is discussed in the desks of the European capitals, has direct implications in the Amazon trees and in many protected areas of our continent.

SERVICIOS. La vida en la comunidad de Comandancia (Loreto) transcurre sin agua potable ni red telefónica. Y la luz eléctrica requiere de baterías externas.

Fotos: OjoPúblico / Marco Garro.

“FSC has the best wood certification system in the world, I have no doubt.We are taking improvement actions in our system, which is in constant improvement.We are investing a lot in technology to be more assertive.From 2015 until today we have advanced greatly and that is because we have been dedicated to improving, ”argued Bruno Rath, director of FSC for Latin America in an interview with Eyopublico.

The cases of companies sanctioned for using wood of illegal origin, despite having the green label multiplied in recent years.An example?The German justice last April to the businessman Stephan Bührich, general director of the wood Wob Timber GmbH and several of its employees for illegal imports from the forests of Myanmar.The Executive was sentenced to 21 months in prison under probation and the company was confiscated more than 3.3 million euros corresponding to the 31 exports from the Asian country.Wob Timber imported teak, a wood that is used mainly to furnish luxury yachts.

Wob Timber, which has current FSC certification until May 2022, not only imported wood from Asia.While the Bührich executive listened.The German company registered, between February 20 and September 2021, more than 39 tons in six shipments of sawn wood acquired from the company Mil Madeiras Precious Ltda, based in the Brazilian state of Amazonas.

The timber company of Brazil, which is part of the Swiss group Priceus Woods, registers two FSC Chain Custody certifications, one in force until November 2022 and another until August 2024."Wob Timber imported from the Amazon, which is certified, is 100% sustainable origin?" Asked Eyopublico.Far from a certainty, FSC replied that the organization does not have "specific information in this case".

“FSC has only certified 2% of Latin America forests.The approach is wrong: the risk is in the remaining 98%, which is left to the random of drug trafficking, livestock, soybeans and illegal mining.That is the real risk.That 98% without certifying does not have any protection.From FSC we need to add more public and private actors, we need to make agreements with governments.That is the restlessness that does not let me sleep, ”Rath argued.

How green label works

FSC, the most important wood certifier in the world, is a civil association constituted in Mexico but whose central office works in Germany.The organization is made up of three areas: business, social and environmental.Each of them chooses four representatives that make up the 12 members of the FSC International Board.Latinos are a majority in this group of leaders who make the most transcendent decisions of the organization.

In turn, FSC has chapters in several countries.In the FSC Peru Board of Directors, for example, Alfredo Biasevich Barreto appears.This lawyer is also president of the Wood Committee of the National Society of Industries, position from which he has shown his rejection of a possible inclusion of Shihuahuaco in the list of endangered species, despite the fact that scientists have warned that this tree is indanger of disappearing.

How does FSC work in practice?The organization has a group of auditing companies that makes available to companies that wish to certify their wood.These firms, then, must hire the auditors to carry out the corresponding inspection.In some cases, the review is physical and detailed, but in others - it depends on the type of certificate that is required - only legal documentation is reviewed.

This financial modality on which the FSC system arouses controversy from its conception rests.“The recent scandals showed that there is complicity in relationships and an intentional blindness of the auditors that have been revealed in the failure of the existing mechanisms.This creates a serious conflict of interest and weakens the integrity of the main process of the FSC: the audit.The organization must consider new alternative financing agreements in their letter in their letter.In a favorable scenario, the applicant firm receives the FSC seal for five years with annual audits to verify compliance with the agreements.In addition, the certified company must make a periodic payment to maintain the license that varies according to the size of the company.FSC stays with a percentage of that fee.If a firm does not meet the requirements, the company can request new audits with the prior implementation of changes included in the rejected certification report.“I repeat: it is the best wood certification system in the world.Our large number of customers gives us guarantee of independence.Auditors can tell you not to a customer who happens nothing because we have many customers.We do not need a single client, no matter how big it is, ”Rath argued.FSC issues different types of certification worldwide.In Brazil, the first country in the region, there are more than 1.400 current stamps and in Peru there are another 74, 28.3% of them granted between 2020 and 2021.In the FSC records there are also another 76 expired certifications between 2007 and 2021.The organization can deliver its seal as part of the “Chain of Custody” mode, which verifies that the products used by manufacturers, processors and merchants are separated from materials that do not have the FSC certification.Most Peruvian certificates (56 cases) correspond to this type of audit.There are 11 certifications in Peru corresponding to the forest management granted to administrators or owners of forests that accredit, after approving an evaluation, the FSC guidelines.And four other certifications belong to the category of controlled wood, granted to products whose origin are forests that do not have FSC certification but are verified to avoid wood from “unacceptable sources”.The products of this item can be combined with certified wood and in these cases they carry a “Mixed FSC” label."The different types of certificates with different standards confuse the consumer even more, from" 100 %FSC "to" controlled wood "FSC Mix", which can include unbelievable wood, "the NGOs insisted on their letter, another of theirclaims to the certifier.For Julia Urrunaga, director in Peru of EIA, one of the failures of this international seal is that she has not focused on warning what happens in the forest or beyond the certificate to its members.“The FSC should not allow companies to certify only a small part of their business and use it as a public relations strategy to cover up their usual activity.This, in the medium and long term, can end the reputation of the seal and the companies that do strive to do things well they will no longer want to have the same certification as the illegal, ”he said to Eyopublico.

Once the certificates are issued, the alarms jump.There are 614 cases of labels suspended in 69 countries.The list is headed by India (91), Ukraine (66) and Vietnam (36).Brazil is the first in the region with 33 suspended certificates.In this same group, three belong to Peru and another 54 to Latin America (9.2% of the total).In the Peruvian case it is the Wayra Digital Printing companies, Amaz Home SAC and Sepahua SAC concession, the first two domiciled in Lima and the last in the Ucayali region.All the signatures were suspended in 2021 and their certifications were valid until 2022 and 2024.

ALIMENTOS. Una vez por semana, miembros de la comunidades vecinas de Comandancia y Santa Úrsula atraviesan en río Amazonas para comprar diferentes tipos de carne ahumada.

LÍDER. Richard Delgado, presidente de la comunidad yagua de San José de Topal, se dedica a diario a la agricultura de sus frutas y verduras.

Fotos: OjoPúblico / Marco Garro.

When consulted on the certification granted to investments La Oroza and its investigation by the Yacu Kallpa case, the FSC office in Peru said that “the questioned wood did not come from certified areas, but that it was made of wood acquired to third parties and thatIt was also marketed as unbelievable wood ".By insisting on the filters they handle to guarantee sustainability at the origin of the wood, the local office indicated that the “forest management certification” applied to a forest or forest area in particular and not to the entire company.

In the case of custody chain certification, according to the response of the FSC office in Peru, a “specific product” was certified in the supply chain and not “all products and supply chains of a supply of acompany those who are certified ".That is, having this seal does not mean that a company is free to be linked to illegal activities.

The Madero SAC consortium and the Vargas Amazonian SAC Business Group, two signatures linked to Edgar Vargas Pulido, a businessman processed in the Loreto Environmental Prosecutor's Office and organized crime of Ucayali, also have current FSC certifications.

The specialist of the Center for International Environmental Law (Ciel), Rolando Navarro Gómez, considers that all companies that have certified forests have complied with the standards and early FSC.However, the problem is in the wood on which the origin is not known and that companies also acquire.“Let's say that as a company I have a commitment to [market] 100 thousand cubic meters of wood, but from that total only 20 thousand meters come from my certified forests and the rest of any site.That origin is controversy.This is where the FSC is not entering that audit, ”he explained to this media.

When the system fails

The last case that put FSC back under the magnifyingMost European middle -class households.The irregularities that the companies of the Russian magnate Evgeny Bakurov would have not been discovered were not discovered by the FSC auditors, but by the British NGO Earthsight, which published the investigation last June.

The same happened with the Austrian company HS Timber Group.The EIA organization revealed in 2015 that this company, with a FSC label, bought wood from illegal felling in Romania, a case that reached the Congress of that country.

“A fundamental defect of the FSC system is that it does not seem to be designed to detect and punish infractions, but depends on external actors, in most cases independent NGOs.These organizations depend to discover illegalities and other infractions to their own standards, ”said Julia Urrunaga de EIA.

“It is rare to obtain a rapid and significant reaction from FSC to legitimate complaints.The cases in which the FSC has been disconnected from certain companies have required enormous external and public pressure to reach this result.What happens is that they usually temporarily suspend companies due to violations, and lift the suspension once an accredited organization has determined that enough corrective measures have been taken, ”he added.

Rath chose to compare FSC's decisions with the actions of justice.“Let's see what happens in court: one is innocent until the opposite is demonstrated.It is a fundamental principle.We are open to receive complaints and take them very seriously, because they are not decisions that can be made lightly.Precisely, that seriousness can cause slowings that can lengthen the processes a bit.But we have to be assertive and precise with the decision, ”he said.

What happened in Romania?After the scandal for wood of illegal origin was made public, the German certifier suspended the HS Timber Group license.But some years later, last November, FSC announced that they would return to work together because the company had been able to demonstrate changes that guarantee the legality of its supply chain.The decision was repudiated by different environmental NGOs.

"We focus on the integrity of our value chain and what we expect is that greater number of companies, volume and forest surface is protected.Something like this [as investments La Oroza in Peru] is the case of HS [Timber Group] in Romania.It is a story of a positive change: a company that disseminated and that has been incorporated having implemented a route of improving good practices, "Compared Rath.

VACÍO. La certificación FSC no ha podido garantizar que todas las empresas que cuentan con este sello no tengan vínculos con la deforestación.

Foto: OjoPúblico / Marco Garro.

Despite his interpretation, cases such as the one that happened with HS Timber not only caused criticism, but organizations such as Greenpeace stopped being part of the certifier.“Companies use FSC as an excuse to import illegal wood.Here the problem is that internal conflict resolution procedures are very slow, ”the Spanish Michelangel Soto, Greenpeace Wood Specialist, told Greenpeace Wood.

What is the FSC reaction when a company with its seal sells wood of illegal origin?The organization's response is slow and, in many cases, controversy, specialists agree.Far from forests, the decision is played in the offices of Bonn, in Germany.The discussion crosses, in some cases, the three blocks that make up the certification's board, but focuses especially on the economic area, composed of companies with millionaire interests in wood marketing.Latinos are a majority in the economic area, which has the most weight when the business behavior is evaluated.The representatives are the Brazilian Ivone Satsuki Namikawa, which is linked to the Klabin company.He is a Brazilian giant, world leader in the export of packaging paper that has 24 factories in Brazil and 25.000 employees.Brazil is a key player for FSC in the region: it is the Latin American country with more green labels with a total of 1482 current certifications (another group of 33 are suspended by possible irregularities).The other representative of the South American business world is Ralph Schmidt-Liermann, who works at the Uruguay.The company exports 1.4 million tons of cellulose per year.Schmidt-Liermann and his colleague Satsuki Namikawa are two key votes when the FSC Board must define the sanctions to companies around the world.“The problem is that for FSC the certified company has more credibility than the complainant.It is evident that the organization is very influenced by the business sector.Companies play with advantage, because the complainant spends one or two years together and companies spend that time to defend themselves to defend themselves.FSC should invest much more energy in resolving conflicts, that there are.Thus, his reputation is very damaged because he does not solve quickly, ”added Soto de Greenpeace.

Tags S.

FSC is a non -profit civil association, but that legal cover does not prevent you from increasing, year after year, your income.The certifier is constituted in Oaxaca, Mexico, but added five subsidiary companies located in Germany (three of them), China and Malaysia.Of those firms, only FSC International Center (dedicated to the world preservation of forest resources) is registered as a "nonprofit" organization.The rest was registered as companies.They are FSC Global Development (dedicated to the licenses business and registered trademarks) and Accreditation Services International GmbH (audit of certifications), both registered in Germany.In China, FSC Beijing Global Forestry Management Consulting (dedicated to consulting at the forest management) and Malaysia, Asia Pacific SDN BHD (evaluation of organizations issued by certificates) was recorded..The balance corresponding to exercise 2020, the last available online, indicates that the income of the certifier and its subsidiaries exceeded US $ 44 million.More than 80% of the proceeds correspond to the payment of the annual canons that companies make to maintain green labels.The rise in FSC's income was staggered: the previous year had been US $ 40 million and in 2018 it was US $ 37 million.How much should each company pay for your certificate?Eyopopublic asked the question in an interview and then in writing, but the organization authorities refused to give a specific number.“The annual amount paid is a calculation that directly makes the certifying body [the auditors], no FSC.This amount depends on multiple variables, including the type of certificate and organization size, for example.There is no average price, ”they explained.The certifier does not charge it, but directly receives a percentage of each of the labels issued.

COMERCIO. Algunas comunidades de la Amazonía peruana se dedican a la venta de madera proveniente de sus bosques, pero hay casos donde han sido engañados por empresarios.

Foto: OjoPúblico / Marco Garro.

The balance does not inform who are the clients of FSC China or in other countries in the matter of consulting.In this country, according to FSC data, more than 2 are recorded.900 in force and more than 6.500 expired.“FSC Beijing Global Forestry Consulting is not a commercial office, therefore, it has no clients as such.This FSC office groups the different stakeholders in China and the income it receives comes mainly from the matrix in Germany to support the local team and operation, ”they said from the certifier.Bonn's central offices, Germany, and the consultant in China were distant from the company's headquarters, in Oaxaca, where the organization was born almost 30 years ago.These desktop negotiations are even more distant from the daily reality of Amazonian communities.Although the importance of raw material, wood, and the deceptions of businessmen in the sector are also repeated in command.Encouraged by entrepreneurs in the area, the residents of Comandancia carried out forest activities based on personal permits obtained from the regional authorities of the sector.However, the ignorance and deception of some entrepreneurs in the area - as Ramírez Santana recounts - generated that their community is fined in 2012 by cutting unauthorized wood in an area of their forests."We ourselves have prevented our mountain," says Gerlin Ramirez with resignation by remembering how different timber businessmen advised command so that the population obtains forest permits and extract wood from their forests.“We told the inhabitant that they could sell 30 pieces but in the end, as there was enough, they multiplied that amount.That made the wood scarce ".

From the area surrounded by forests and a few meters from the Amazon River, where there is no telephone network or drinking water, a group of workers of a boat loads pieces of wood whose final destination is unknown to the members of the Commander Community.They only know that it will arrive at the port of Iquitos, capital of the Loreto region, but they find them new and ignore if the company owner of the wood has FSC certification, a seal that they say that guarantees the sustainability of 2% of all the forests of theAmazon.