Chain of Custody standard

The Chain of Custody (CoC) standard is the main normative document for the companies wishing to be FSC-certified.

It provides the minimum management and production requirements for CoC within a company in order to demonstrate that forest-based materials and products purchased, labelled, and sold as FSC-certified originate from well-managed forests, controlled sources, reclaimed materials, or a mixture of these.

COC standard worker reading document
Factory workers

To whom does FSC CoC certification apply?

For a product to be claimed as FSC-certified, there must be an unbroken chain of companies covering every change in legal ownership of the product. CoC certification is therefore required for all companies in the supply chain of forest-based products that have legal ownership of certified products and perform at least one of the following activities:

1) sell FSC-certified products with FSC claims on sales documents,
2) label products as FSC certified,
3) manufacture or change the composition or physical integrity of products sold with FSC claims, or
4) promote FSC-certified products, except finished and FSC-labelled products that may be promoted by non-certificate holders (e.g. retailers).

What is inside the CoC standard?

  1. PART: Universal Requirements

    1) CoC management system

    2) Material sourcing

    3) Material handling

    4) FSC material and products records

    5) Sales

    6) Compliance with timber legality legislations

    7) FSC core labour requirements

  2. PART: Control of FSC Claims

    8) Establishment of product groups for the control of FSC claims

    9) Transfer system

    10) Percentage system

    11) Credit system

  3. PART: Supplementary Requirements

    12) FSC labelling requirements

    13) Outsourcing

  4. PART: Eligibility Criteria for Single, Multi-site, and Group CoC Certification

    14) Eligibility for single CoC certification

    15) Eligibility for multi-site CoC certification

    16) Eligibility for group CoC certification

Download the CoC standard

The Chain of Custody standard is available in English, Croatian, or Serbian (Cyrillic) languages. Please not that in case of discrepancies between the translation of the standard and the original English version, the English version is considered correct.

FSC-STD-40-004 V3-1 HR Certifikacija Lanca Sljedivosti
PDF, Size: 2.24MB
FSC-STD-40-004 V3-1 SR Сертификација ланца надзора
PDF, Size: 2.16MB
FSC-STD-40-004_V3-1_EN.pdf
PDF, Size: 831.69KB