Communities, family forest owners, and Indigenous Peoples have long been the unsung heroes of forest stewardship, their intimate connection to the land shaping sustainable practices for generations. As custodians of the world's forests, their role is pivotal in preserving biodiversity and ensuring the long-term health of our ecosystems. Recognizing their significance, FSC has the Community and Family Forests Toolbox, a comprehensive set of solutions aimed at empowering these groups and enhancing their capacity to safeguard our forests.

FSC is updating its sustainable forestry requirements with three concurrent public consultations. This consultation includes system-wide changes to align with the intention of FSC’s Policy to Address Conversion, the updated FSC Risk Assessment Framework and FSC Regulatory Module. The public consultation for these requirements is open until 1 March 2024 on the Consultation Platform.

FSC is conducting the revision of the FSC-PRO-30-006 V1-2 Ecosystem Services Procedure: Impact Demonstration and Market Tools. The second draft of the revised procedure (Draft 2-0) aims to streamline the structure and readability of the procedure, strengthen the verification of ecosystem services impacts, improve the adaptability for small or low intensity managed forests – (SLIMF) and community forests users, strengthen the use of ecosystem services claims, and introduce a revenue sharing mechanism, among others.