Forest certification
The South Carolina Forestry Commission is committed to continually achieving independent certification to the Sustainable Forestry Initiative® (SFI) Requirements for the (2022) Program and the American Forest Foundation (AFF) (2021) Standards of Sustainability for Forest Certification.
The Forestry Commission is committed to promoting and achieving the Principles of Sustainable Forest Management including: practicing sustainable forestry, employing responsible practices, regenerating the forest and maintaining productive capacity, protecting and maintaining long-term forest and soil productivity, evaluating climate-smart and fire resilience awareness, protecting water resources, protecting special sites and biological diversity, complying with legal requirements, and continually improving forest practices.
The Forestry Commission is committed to comply with applicable laws and regulations, including social laws. The Commission strives to involve interested and affected parties in its sustainable forest management programs and to consider their comments and inputs in making management decisions.
To help implement and achieve the Sustainable Forestry Initiative and American Forest Foundation Standards, the Forestry Commission has developed and adopted appropriate programs, plans and procedures to guide its land management activities. These programs and plans are contained in the certification manual, the SFI Program and other written documents.
The Forestry Commission is committed to comply with applicable laws and regulations and takes appropriate steps to comply. The Commission is also committed to annually review the effectiveness of its management programs to continually improve the practice of sustainable forestry.
Indigenous people’s rights
The South Carolina Forestry Commission is committed to recognizing and respecting the historic and current use of the land, water, forest, and natural resources by Indigenous People who live and have lived throughout the state of South Carolina.
The South Carolina Forestry Commission is aware of and interacts with the South Carolina Commission of Minority Affairs for information related to indigenous people. The South Carolina Commission of Minority Affairs was created in 1993 by the SC General Assembly. In 2001, the Native American Affairs Committee was created to establish and strengthen relationships between Native American Indian communities and government agencies. The Native American Affairs Committee is responsible for state recognition of Native American entities. The Commission of Minority Affairs is regulated under Title 1, Chapter 31 of the SC Code of Laws and Chapter 139 of the SC Code of Regulations.
The South Carolina Forestry Commission recognizes the established framework of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The South Carolina Forestry Commission is committed to ensuring individual rights, collective rights, cultural rights, political status, rights to education, rights of health, rights of employment, and the right of discrimination against all Indigenous Peoples are upheld. This declaration was adopted on September 13, 2007.
The South Carolina Forestry Commission is committed to seeking out training opportunities for employees through agency training guidelines. Indigenous Peoples’ Rights training will be evaluated and provided annually to state forest staff through in-house SFI update. The Agency will seek to provide or make aware of training opportunities for contractors conducting business on state forest lands.