Forest Certification in Collectively Owned Forest Areas and Sustainable Forest Management: A Case of Cooperative-Based Forest Certification in China

This paper presents a successful case of forest certification of organized small forestland holders in China and examines problems and challenges encountered. The Forest Stewardship Council certification of forestland of Longquan Nengfu Professional Cooperative for Forestation is analyzed to illustrate the feasibility of forest certification in the form of cooperatives in the collectively owned forest areas in southern China. The main challenges identified include centralized forestland ownership and decentralized forest tenure, identification of plantation or natural forest, monitoring of potential effects of forest management, and identification and conservation of high conservation value forests. It is demonstrated that long-term stable forestland tenure, popularization of knowledge of forest certification, and involvement of local government agencies in forest certification are important for sustainable forest management in the cooperative-based forest certification.