Successful first meeting with stakeholders in North Macedonia on new FSC standard development

Thanks to the excellent work of FSC local consultants Prof. Nikolce Velkovski and Dr. Jurant Dika, the meeting was well organized and very well received by the local community. More than 30 local stakeholders attended the event, including representatives of relevant institutions as well as key environmental and social organizations and trade unions in the country. During the meeting, Professor Velkovski provided an in-depth analysis of the Macedonian forestry sector and highlighted the benefits of introducing FSC Forest Management certification.

Dr. Dika presented in detail the proposed adaptation of the eight indicators that this innovative “faster approach” to the development of interim national FSC standards allows to be modified. Participating stakeholders had the opportunity to express their views, opinions, and concerns directly to the standard developer. In addition, all participants were invited to take part in the ongoing public consultation, open until 18 December.

North Macedonia’s forest resources are significant, comprising 907,255 hectares of state-owned forests and 142,045 hectares of privately owned forests. We look forward to the approval of the new Forest Management Standard by FSC International by summer 2026, enabling Macedonian forest managers to begin adopting it and adjusting their forest management practices in order to obtain FSC certification as soon as possible.

Beyond being a long-standing objective of the state forest company, this standard is also strongly requested by the country’s leading wood-processing companies, which are already Chain of Custody certified and wish to source national FSC-certified timber rather than relying on imports from neighboring countries.