STTA Report: Development of FSC Kosovo standards Report on mission (May 27-30 2012)

The program included four main components: private sector support in targeted sectors, demand-driven development for business support services, improvement of the business enabling environment, and workforce development. The program also addressed several cross-cutting areas, including gender, youth, and minority development. As part of efforts to improve the competitiveness of the forestry and wood processing sector in Kosovo, the decision was made to support the process of FSC forest certification. The process aimed to prepare Kosovo Forest Agency and other relevant institutions to improve their planning and operational practices in order to meet the requirements of internationally recognized forest management standards. The ultimate goal was to have two selected forest management units FSC certified and a number of wood processors supplied with timber from these units. The first step in the process was to develop FSC standards for Kosovo and have them accredited with FSC, strictly following the prescribed procedures. Under the previous assignment, the Standard Development Group (SDG) was formed and applied to FSC for registration. The group prepared the second draft of the standard and submitted it for approval with FSC in September 2010. FSC gave the last comments and preconditions for the standard to be approved on May 8, 2012. The May 2012 mission included activities aimed at finishing the process of development of FSC Kosovo national standard. The main objectives of the subtask were to address all questions raised by FSC, facilitate the work of SDG and their approval, send the necessary documents to FSC for final approval, and investigate the possibility of continuation of the project. The documents prepared were discussed on a meeting with SDG on May 29, 2012. SDG members were informed about the latest developments since the last meeting, including the SDG chair and facilitator keeping contact with FSC, submitting all necessary documents, and receiving comments related to the final approval of the standard on May 8, 2012. The SDG members discussed the proposed changes to the text of standard and concluded that the majority of the FSC proposed indicators were found to be acceptable. They also agreed to change the term "enterprise" to "organization" because it is not in line with Kosovo's legal arrangements in forestry, and suggested deleting indicators 6.9.7 – 6.9.10 as the problem of invasive exotic forest species is not very relevant to Kosovo. The SDG chair and facilitator were tasked with doing additional technical editing to remove redundancies, duplications, missing verifiers, and numbering. The documents were sent on May 30, 2012, and their receipt was immediately acknowledged. The group received assurances that their responses would be processed as soon as possible, which would mean that final approval should come in early June. This would be a great achievement for Kosovo as it would be the first country from ex-Yugoslavia to have a national FSC standard approved. After receiving the final approval, a promotional event with high-profile guests should be organized, and some support from other organizations in Kosovo will be needed for that event. There is also a need to look for an appropriate donor to assist the continuation of planned activities, namely certification of two FMUs and five wood processors.