Sustainable Forestry

Assessment and Classification of HCVF

Forest Carbon works with concession and plantation managers on the sustainable management of their forest areas. Sustainable Forest Management for our clients can be understood as attaining an environmental, social and economic balance in the harvesting or production of forest products, such as timber, biofuels, and or agroforestry products. Additionally, the sustainable management of forests is one of the core elements of REDD+, which can be integrated into many sustainable forest management practices.

Forest Carbon conducts due diligence of potential and existing forest areas for clients and investors interested in developing sustainable forest management practices in their project areas, be it for carbon or timber. In addition to assessments of value from the business standpoint, we are able to focus and assess the broader issues of social, biodiversity and more economics into forest areas.

Through aerial surveys with our own aircraft, Forest Carbon has flown and mapped over a dozen concession areas in Indonesia alone. In Africa, we have conducted ground assessments and due diligence of some of the largest sustainably managed Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) concessions in the Congo Basin.

High Conservation Value Forests (HCVF)

One of the key areas of interest to many of our sustainable forestry clients is the assessment of High Conservation Value Forest (HCVF) areas, a process that is necessary for certification under the FSC. HCVF areas have the following attributes:

• Forest areas containing globally, regionally or nationally significant: concentrations of biodiversity values and/or large landscape-level forests where viable populations of most if not all naturally occurring species exist in natural patterns of distribution and abundance.
• Forest areas that are in or contain rare, threatened or endangered ecosystems.
• Forest areas that provide basic services of nature in critical situations.
• Forest areas fundamental to meeting basic needs of local communities and/or critical to local communities’ traditional cultural identity.

High Conservation Value Forests (HCVF) and REDD+

Assessing the presence of HCVF areas within a project area is an important and critical step for most REDD+ projects. Forest Carbon is certified to conduct assessments for projects wishing to qualify for the Climate, Community and Biodiversity Alliance Standards (CCBA), which requires reporting on the HCVF status of forest areas within projects seeking CCBA certification.