In November 2010 the PEFC General Assembly approved its revised PEFC Chain of Custody standard (PEFC ST 2002:2010) and its amended PEFC Logo use rules (PEFC ST 2001:2008 v2).
In order to inform holders of PEFC Chain of Custody certificates and other stakeholders about the main changes between the old and the revised standards PEFC International held a series of three webinars.
The webinars took place on 16th, 22nd and 23rd February 2011.
All webinars consisted of a presentation from the PEFC Head of Technical Unit, followed by a 30 minutes questions and answers session.
The first webinar was recorded and is available as slidecast.
All Questions submitted during the webinars and Answers provided by PEFC are available on the PEFC International website in written form (www.pefc.org).
1. Revision of the PEFC chain of custody standard (PEFC ST 2002:2010) 16 th F ebruary 2011 Presentation: Mr. Jaroslav Tymrak, Head of Technical Unit PEFC Webinar:
2.
3.
4.
5. Chain of Custody model (clarified) Chain of Custody Process Management System Supplier’s claim Claim to customer C-o-C Process Management System Supplier’s claim Claim to customer C-oC Process C-oC Process Supplier’s claim Claim to customer
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11. Management system requirements C-o-C Verification Process Origin identification Percentage calculation Sale and communication Transfer of percentage to output products Resources Control Top Management responsibilities Review Management system C-o-C process Responsibilities and authorities Documented procedures Record control
12.
13.
14.
15. Recycled material - PEFC claim and recognition (new) PEFC chain of custody results in a single claim “ PEFC certified ” which equally recognises material from PEFC certified forests (primary fibres) and recycled material The company shall know and communicate (upon request) the content of recycled material (based on ISO 14021). The “content of recycled material” would then be used as criterion for the usage of a PEFC label
Options for chain of custody process The company can choose based on its wood and information flow as well as customers needs or marketing strategy the most appropriate chain of custody method. Companies which are not mixing raw material from several sources should use the physical separation method. Companies which are mixing certified raw material and the physical separation would not be technically possible or cost effective can implement percentage based method . Within the percentage based method the certification percentage can be calculated either as simple percentage from the volume of raw material physically included in the production batch or as rolling average from raw material volume procured in the previous time period. The company can then distribute the percentage to the output products using either average percentage (percentage is equally applied to the whole batch) or volume credit method (percentage is distributed to the part of the batch equal to the calculated percentage).
Chain of Custody model The chain of custody as described by the PEFC chain of custody standard is considered as chain of custody process supported by basic management system elements. Chain of custody process (the model above for percentage based methods) describes individual steps during which the company gets from information on certified status attached to the procured raw material (input information) to the information on certified status claimed on the company ’ s sold products (output information). As the output information will serve as input information for the next company, their content shall be the same. The document is structured following the individual steps of the chain of custody process (origin identification, certification percentage calculation, transfer of the calculated percentage to outputs and sale of products). Basic management system elements such as management responsibility, personnel responsibility, documented procedures, records control, resources and internal control mechanisms guarantees that the chain of custody process is operational, have been correctly implemented and maintained. All the management system elements are required by the standard only for the management of the chain of custody process and is not required for other company ’ s processes.