PORTLAND, Ore., Aug. 7 /PRNewswire/ Willamette Industries' forest lands in
North Carolina and South Carolina have passed a third-party audit for
sustainability. Completed in early August, the audit certifies that forest
management activities in Willamette's Eastern region are in full compliance
with the standards of the American Forest & Paper Association's Sustainable
Forestry Initiative (SFI)(SM) program.
PricewaterhouseCoopers, the same independent accounting firm that audited
Willamette's 610,000 acres of Oregon forest lands in September 1999, examined
Willamette's forest management practices in the Carolinas to ensure the
implementation, maintenance and improvement of sustainable forestry.
Willamette owns and manages 167,000 acres in the Carolinas.
The SFI program has 11 objectives, including promptly reforesting
harvested areas, protecting water quality by establishing streamside
protection measures, enhancing the quality of wildlife habitat, and continuing
to improve forest utilization to help ensure the most efficient use of forest
resources.
In its audit, PricewaterhouseCoopers gave Willamette high marks for a
number of the company's forest management practices, such as developing a
system for assessing harvesting risks, supporting rare and endangered species
programs, working with conservation groups to protect sensitive species,
developing a program to address the rehabilitation needs of some old logging
roads, providing protection areas on intermittent streams that in many cases
went beyond state best management practices, and having a forestry staff with
excellent knowledge of the SFI standards and their responsibilities for
implementing those standards.
PricewaterhouseCoopers also helped regional staff identify areas for
improvement. Suggestions included utilizing landscape analysis tools when
developing five-year harvest plans, developing long-term biodiversity goals,
increasing support of research cooperatives, and looking for additional
opportunities to use public opinion information in conjunction with forest
management decisions.
Willamette's remaining forest lands (953,000 acres in Louisiana, Arkansas,
Texas, Tennessee and Missouri) will be audited by PricewaterhouseCoopers this
fall. In total, Willamette's forest lands include 738,000 acres in Louisiana,
Arkansas and Texas; 610,000 acres in Oregon; 215,000 acres in Tennessee and
Missouri; and 167,000 acres in the Carolinas.
According to Marvin Brown, Willamette's director of forest policy, this is
an on-going process that focuses on continuous improvement of Willamette's
forest management program. Lands will be re-audited by a third party on a
regular basis, supplemented by formal internal audits and on-going monitoring
of action plans that address goals for continued progress and improvement.
Willamette Industries is a vertically integrated, Fortune 500 forest
products company with 107 manufacturing facilities in the United States,
Ireland, France and Mexico. The company owns 1.7 million acres of forest land
in the United States and manages it sustainably to produce a variety of
building materials and paper products.
SOURCE Willamette Industries, Inc.
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CONTACT:
Marvin Brown, 803-802-8101
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