3rd Party Certification and Legality Verification Service Providers
The following list is intended as a resource for companies looking for 3rd party certifiers and is provided for information purposes only. Note that this is not an exhaustive list. We welcome additional submissions by members and certifiers. IWPA does not endorse any provider on the list.
IWPA Member Service Providers
Chaffin and Associates, Inc. (C&A) has overseas offices with laboratories in Nanjing, China and Sibu, Sarawak, Malaysia. The laboratories are IAS accredited under ISO/IEC 17025:2005. These facilities are involved in the certification of plywood, MDF and particle board mills, providing laboratory testing of wood products for formaldehyde, ongoing quality assurance of production, and other activities for the purpose of assuring CARB compliance for products imported to the U.S. The certification services and laboratory testing are in conjunction with Professional Service Industries, Inc. (PSI), see C&A also provides independent, third party audits and verification for Lacey Act compliance for mills in China, Malaysia and Thailand.
Compliance Specialists, LLC created "Complying with the Lacey Act: A Real World Guide"to provide practical, user-friendly assistance to help wood importers and exporters develop due-diligence procedures to comply with the Lacey Act. The Guide and companion CD ROM (with sample databases and adaptable documentation) will educate you about the details of the law and preparing import declarations, and help you establish a cost-effective compliance system. It also provides tools to communicate with both customers and suppliers about their roles and responsibilities.The firm also offers additional consulting services for international trade in wood products.
PFS is a recognized third party certifier for the state of California’s regulation on formaldehyde levels in composite wood products. In addition, PFS certifies a broad range of products and structures, including all types of engineered wood products, wood building components, and industrialized building systems.
PSIPSI/PTL Engineered Wood Products (EWP) Division provides a wide range of independent trademarking, testing and certification services on a global scale.
The Engineered Wood Products Division has been testing and certifying panel products since 1956. Located in Eugene, Oregon, EWP Division works globally with foreign and North American manufacturers, governments, associations, business development, marketing, code officials and customers. Their modern facility has the latest equipment and testing procedures in place and our trained staff has years of experience in order to offer the highest level of quality and services at competitive costs.
Shorepoint Insurance Services provides insurance solutions to the wood products industry, including coverage for Lacey Act and CARB.
Other
Accreditation Services International (ASI )accredits Certification Bodies to provide a credible assurance that they are competent and independent in providing certification services according to FSC Standards.
Certisource tracks individual batches of logs through the entire supply chain ensuring that exported timber products are fully traceable to a known and licensed concession. Independent verification of source and legality ensures that the supply chain is transparent and minimizes the traditional reliance on government issued documents.
Certisource does not certify the operations of forest concessions, sawmills, timber importers or retailers. Instead it agrees to Chain of Custody procedures with all elements of the supply chain before they start working with them and then carry out regular inspections to ensure that agreed procedures are being followed. In this way Certisource is proactive in validating operations on the ground and does not rely on the periodic submission and inspection of data to determine compliance.
SCS (Scientific Certification Systems)Scientific Certification Systems (SCS) is the number one FSC certifier in the United States, and has issued certificates in 33 countries around the world. Providing certification to the Forest Stewardship Council’s (FSC) Forest Management and Chain of Custody standards, SCS also offers wood product manufacturers the option of pursuing certification for single attribute claims (e.g., recycled content, recovered, salvaged wood, etc.). In addition, SCS offers Legal Harvest Verification, CARB ATCM compliance, and FloorScore® certification.
SGS offers its Timber Legality & Traceability Verification (TLTV) to the private sector as a “voluntary, company level” approach, which incorporates regular auditing, or continuous monitoring and verification of a company’s wood production and tracking information, outside any national scheme.TLTV potentially involves a combination of the following activities:
Verification of log/timber production and tracking data - involving review of timber tracking systems, from port back to stump in legitimate forest concession: Auditing of company data and specific legality investigations and checks; and, Data monitoring and processing, information analysis and reporting.
Smartwood is the Rainforest Alliance program that offers in addition to Forest Stewardship Council, a multitude of certification and verification services including Verification of Legal Origin and Verification of Legal Compliance.
Verification of Legal Origin (VLO) verifies that timber comes from a source that has a documented legal right to harvest, pursuant to the laws and regulations of the government of the jurisdiction. Suppliers of VLO timber must follow and maintain documented chain-of-custody systems.
Verification of Legal Compliance (VLC) expands upon the basic component of VLO by verifying that timber harvesting complies with all applicable and relevant laws and regulations related to forestry.
The Tropical Forest FoundationLegal Verified Chain of Custody®(CoC) program provides a widely recognized standard to prove that manufacturers have performed due diligence and buyers can be assured that their products are legally sourced.
TropicalForest Trust (TFT) features its Traceability Systems to analyze environmental risk, develop an action plan to eliminate risks, and moves to meet demands for legal compliance and certification. TFT works in factories and forests to facilitate the development and provide ongoing monitoring of robust Wood Control Systems (WCS), also known as Chain of Custody (CoC) systems.