Bringing indigenous representation into the FSC through the Permanent Indigenous Peoples Committee: Voices from the Ground

And then you have the environmental chamber which is very much governed by the big international NGOs like WWF, Greenpeace, and others, who also are very resourceful and also have people who are sitting there working on paid salary time.

And then there’s the social chamber, which is a diversity of organisations, unions, NGOs, and then one individual representing an entire group of indigenous peoples. So that imbalance is built into the system. The social chamber at FSC is weak and has always been weak, and it is also suffering from internal discussions. And I experienced that recently in the FSC meeting in Bali in 2022 as well.

 I gradually realized that there were countries in the world that had developed Aboriginal chambers instead, like in Canada and in New Zealand. The reason they exist is due to the fact that indigenous peoples are not an homogenous group.

 

“The one size fits all model doesn't work for indigenous peoples.”

 

Indigenous peoples are very heterogeneous. You can find people who are living in total isolation for four generations, but you can also find very developed businessmen running multi-billion companies, and to place all that in one chamber doesn't really fit.

What was a successful moment for indigenous peoples at FSC?

I would say the best experience was probably when we had the General Assembly in Kota Kinabalu in 2011. At that General Assembly, the National Aboriginal Forest Association in Canada presented a motion where they said that in order to strengthen Indigenous people, we need to have a Permanent Indigenous Peoples Committee connected to the board of directors, as an alternative to having a fourth chamber.

And when the motion passed with a full majority, that was a good moment, because then we realised that maybe we could find support for indigenous issues within FSC.

 

“That’s when I saw that there are some advantages of working in an organisation like FSC.”

 

Two years later, and after a lot of work, we had the FSC Permanent Indigenous Peoples Committee (PIPC) up and running. The PIPC consists of representatives of indigenous peoples from all over the world, and functions as an advisory committee to the FSC International Board of Directors.

What makes the PIPC different from other committees in FSC?

The difference starts with the way it was set up. Even though the PIPC motion was approved in 2011, it still took us two years to get it started. Why? Because our starting point was arranging regional meetings all around the world, which is the typical way of doing it in the indigenous world; we want to consult and do it properly.

 

“For many indigenous peoples, the tradition for discussions is circular, not linear.”

 

That means that you discuss things going around in a circle until you have found a kind of consensus. In the Western world we go from A to B as far and fast as possible, which is not the way of doing it in the indigenous thought tradition.

Through these discussions, we quickly realised that in order to be an active advisor to the board, we needed to be more proactive than reactive. And to be proactive you need resources. You need someone who helps you.

But there is a financial issue when you have a committee of laypeople. If you’re sitting in a big NGO that has a turnover of a couple of million dollars, you have resources behind you. But if you’re sitting in a local indigenous peoples’ organisation somewhere in the world, what kind of resources do you have? A lot of us had to work on a pro-bono basis to get things started.

So although the annual stipend for FSC is about the same for different committees, the indigenous organisations did not have the same financial support. This was the reason why in 2019 we created the FSC Indigenous Foundation based in Panama. This foundation is now partly working to support PIPC in their work within FSC, but the foundation also has a mission to work with supporting indigenous peoples in a global perspective in the Indigenous Cultural Landscapes where they live their lives.

What is the biggest achievement of PIPC?

We are now bringing indigenous issues into the open and having more discussions about indigenous peoples and their importance in forestry in a world faced by climate catastrophe.

 

“That is very important because I am a strong believer that indigenous peoples may have the best solutions when it comes to the mitigation of climate change.”

 

But we are still just sitting on the table. We have not seen any breakthrough in our visions and missions. And, you know, for instance, only 1% of all money that goes to climate change goes to indigenous peoples.

Where I live in the Arctic, we are now standing on the edge of what our culture can survive in. The Arctic is the canary bird of climate change. So, when in Paris we discuss global temperature increases of 1.5 to 2 degrees, in the Arctic we are already up to four degrees in some areas. Perhaps in one generation, we will no longer have our reindeer husbandry culture, which is centuries old.

So, we see this on our bare skin. The world is on a pathway that must be changed, otherwise it will lead to disaster not only for the Arctic, but for the whole world. And in that storytelling, indigenous peoples could play a great part.

 

“We need to show that indigenous peoples are going to want to be a part of the solution and do not want to be regarded as victims. We are now actively trying to do this within the FSC Indigenous Foundation.”

 

What is FSC's role in making space for indigenous peoples to create their own solutions?

The FSC has a role, but it is not a definitive role. There are examples, however, where FSC rules have been instrumental in making positive change for indigenous peoples.

One was the motion about the ‘Intact Forest Landscape,’ created by Greenpeace. One day before it was going to be put forward for voting, Greenpeace realised that they hadn’t spoken to any indigenous people about this, and they came running to us at PIPC.

We told them categorically that we would vote against the motion because there are no intact forest landscapes. It’s the idea of the ‘great wilderness,’ a forest with nobody living in it, something that doesn’t exist. We say that the great wilderness is created by indigenous people.

We told Greenpeace to change the concept, or at least mention that there cannot be any intact forest landscape without Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC), otherwise we would vote against it. So they quickly amended that and got FPIC into the motion so we could support it.

Read more in this FSC review: Policy Matters: Do commodity certification schemes uphold indigenous peoples rights? 

You said that the FSC complaints mechanism is bureaucratic, slow, and difficult to understand. What needs to change?

A lot needs to change, I would say. Well, first of all, they need to make the system more understandable. I mean, if you are a reindeer herder working in the forest and the forest is cut down in a way that you didn't expect, how can you use the system for your complaints? It's not easy to understand.

So you need to work out that first, you should try to approach the forest owner. And if they don't listen, then approach the certification body. And if they don't listen, you have to go to Assurance Services International. And if they don't listen, you need to get in contact with FSC International.

 

“The complaints mechanism has a lot of steps and it takes a lot of time. By the time that you have reached the board of directors at FSC, the forest is gone. We need to speed up the system.”

 

It's a slow process and it's not it's not easy to get an overview of how it works. So we need it to be easier and faster.

How else can FSC become more accessible to indigenous peoples?

The FSC is a very, very complex organization with very complex rules and principles and criteria.

 

“I’ve been working with FSC for 16 years, and I used to say that I was confused when I started. I’m still confused now, but on a higher level.”

 

One way to become more accessible is to work on the documentation of FSC. Although FSC was probably the first certifying organisation that made FPIC mandatory, the bigger question is how well it is implemented. I have been working on the official guidance for FPIC, but I realised that when the guidance was made, it was aimed at the certifying companies and focused on giving them the information they need. There isn’t a document that provides indigenous peoples with what they need to know when a company approaches them to start an FPIC process.

So, at PIPC, we made a manual for indigenous peoples on the implementation of FPIC in forestry operations, giving them advice on how it works and how to prepare for the process. I’m hopeful that this will help, and it will be very interesting to see how FPIC will be introduced within the FSC families.

 

“That will be a major step because if you can't guard the indigenous peoples’ rights, then there's nothing else to discuss.”

 

Despite all the issues I’ve mentioned, I would say that FSC is probably the gold standard. But even being a gold standard means that we have not reached gold yet. There is more work to be done – much more…

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

*Anders Blom has been engaged in the Permanent Indigenous Peoples Committee within the FSC and he has also been Managing Director of the National Swedish Sami Reindeer herding association and been a member of the Arctic Economic Council. He founded the Protect Sami foundation, an organisation that aims to assist and create capacity for Saami rightsholders in their dialogue with competing land interests, for example with mining companies or wind farms; he chaired the foundation for the first six years. Blom has been actively engaging with the FSC since 2008.