Industry Commitment on Responsible Forestry Practices: First Report by the Beverage Carton Sector on Wood Traceability

The world’s three leading beverage carton manufacturers met in Brussels today with senior EU officials including MEP Eija-Riitta Korhola, member of the Parliament’s Environment Committee.

The world’s three leading beverage carton manufacturers met in Brussels today with senior EU officials including MEP Eija-Riitta Korhola, member of the Parliament’s Environment Committee. The companies, representing about 80% of the sector’s global market, presented a report to the Commission and to MEPs on the commitment made in July 2007* on responsible wood sourcing. This commitment has a dual aim: to achieve verified traceability through a 100% chain-of-custody certification of all wood fiber used in beverage carton manufacture by the three companies worldwide by 2015, thus helping to prevent the use of wood from unacceptable sources; and to reach 100% traceability certification by 2018 of their plants that manufacture packaging material.

Niels Petter Wright, Elopak’s CEO commented: “We can report some significant progress in getting a credible system in place for tracing the wood fibres we use back to their forest of origin. Rolf Stangl, CEO of SIG Combibloc explained: “We are convinced that this commitment is an excellent example of how industry can act very effectively in complementing EU policy goals, reaching out even globally. We are working full steam ahead to extend traceability certification to all our operations around the world”. Almost 2.5 million tonnes of paperboard were used by the three beverage carton manufacturers in 2007. On average, 75% of each beverage carton is made of paperboard from renewable forestry sources.

Released today, the first report by ProForest - an independent verifier of supply chain practices - sets the baseline performance level attained by the three companies at end 2007. It found that 47% of the fibres used as raw materials by the companies were certified according to the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) Forest Management and / or the FSC Controlled Wood standard. In addition, 3 out of the 54 manufacturing plants were certified to comply with the FSC chain-of-custody standard at that time.

Commissioner Dimas remarked: “Knowing where one is getting one's timber from is good for business and allows companies to be confident that no raw material of unknown or illegal origin enters their supply chain. The ACE commitment to 100% traceability represents a valuable contribution to EU policies to foster responsible forest management, combat illegal logging and develop more sustainable models of consumption and production. I therefore welcome today's report on progress towards this commitment”.

Commented Jan Grönvall, Tetra Pak’s VP for supplier management: “We are aware of the efforts needed as we move ahead to our targets. Since 2007, for example, we have made further significant improvements in the number of carton manufacturing plants certified. We are confident we will reach our goals.”

MEP Korhola, who today chaired a lunch debate in the Parliament on voluntary industry commitments and their role in support of EU policy, said: “As legislators we have a role in setting objectives for responsible resource use and sustainable production, but we can only take things so far. A private sector initiative such as this voluntary commitment is a good example of the practical action sought by FLEGT”, she said, in a reference to the EU’s Action Plan on Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade.