FSC consultation and complaints procedures: the case of Veracel Celulose in Brazil

Disponible uniquement en espagnol, anglais et portugais. 

For many years WRM has been denouncing the FSC certification of monoculture tree plantations. The scale of these monocultures is one of several reasons for such opposition. Large-scale tree plantations occupy vast areas of land leading to displacement of communities, they consume huge amounts of water and soil nutrients and require enormous amounts of agrochemicals. These characteristics make them intrinsically unsustainable and therefore they can’t be certified as ‘sustainable’. Since the early 1990s, communities have faced an additional difficulty in their struggle against plantations: a label that says that the plantations surrounding their communities and that occupy their lands, contaminate the soil and water is sustainable. Yet, the struggle against these very plantations and the companies that own them continue, because the impacts on the communities, the landscape, biodiversity and water remain unchanged.

However, despite this ongoing opposition against FSC certified plantations, we don’t see companies losing the FSC seal. This new WRM publication tries to answer this question. The briefing “FSC consultation and complaints procedures: the case of Veracel Celulose in Brazil” is an example of the unequal ‘dialogue’ between communities struggling to halt industrial tree plantations and certification schemes claiming to improve large-scale monocultures.

FSC consultation and complaints procedures: the case of Veracel Celulose in Brazil

FSC: Procedimientos de consulta y reclamación. El caso de Veracel Celulose en Brasil

A consulta do FSC e procedimentos para queixas: o caso da Veracel Celulose no Brasil