Examination of Witnesses (Questions 69-79)
MR SIMON
FINEMAN AND
MR ADAM
MATTHEWS
25 OCTOBER 2005
Q69 Chairman: Welcome this afternoon.
You have sat in for the previous part of our inquiry. I should
just like to get the context right for us at this stage. I am
aware that you have been lobbying for many years for the Government
to address the issue of illegal timber, and we heard in the previous
session about the gold standards that were needed. Why is it so
important to you, and how much progress do you think has been
made? Can you put in context for us how important this inquiry
is?
Mr Fineman: Good afternoon. Probably
12 years ago Timbmet was the leading hardwood importer in the
country. We were invaded by Earth First activists who pointed
out to us in no uncertain terms that a great deal of the timber
we were importing was illegal, and it took us quite a few years
after that to come to terms with the fact that as a family-based
business we considered ourselves respectable and responsible,
and yet we were caught up in what we had to admit was an illegal
trade. Despite the fact that we are big relatively, with a turnover
of over £100 million and employing 700 people, we felt that
we had a responsibility to grab hold of the issue and move it
forward; and that is what we have been doing ever since.
Chairman: Thank you. That is a very fitting
start to this part of our evidence.
Q70 Mark Pritchard: You call yourself
UK's leading importers and distributors of hardwood timber and
wood products; what proportion of the UK hardwood market do you
supply?
Mr Fineman: That is a really difficult
question because I do not think anybody collects statistics. We
see ourselves on the hardwood side competing in a marketplace
of about £300-350 million, and of that we possibly represent
15% to 20%. It is a very fragmented industry. There are a lot
of players, ranging from very small importers to large players
like ourselves.
Q71 Mark Pritchard: What proportion
of your timber comes from temperate forests and how much from
tropical areas?
Mr Fineman: I would guess round
about 60% comes from temperate.
Q72 Mark Pritchard: What about tropical?
Mr Fineman: That would be the
other 40%.
Chairman: That is getting easy!
Q73 Mark Pritchard: Exactly—there
we are! What proportion of your timber comes from an independently
certified source such as our friends here from the FSC?
Mr Fineman: It has increased massively
in the last few years from an abysmal low of less than 1%. You
asked about those that are independently certified, and I need
to check this, but I think the last time we counted it was 37%[3].
We do have a pretty sophisticated auditing process all of our
own, to try and guarantee that everything is at least legal.
Q74 Mark Pritchard: We have had a discussion
about the credibility of different schemes. What is your view
on the credibility of different schemes; and is there a price
difference that you recognised, based upon the certification of
the different schemes?
Mr Fineman: The number of labels
is confusing for everybody. I personally do not believe that the
marketplace can cope with more than one or two, and there are
already five or six credible labels. I do not think we have very
much doubt at all that the FSC is the gold standard, but we also
recognise that it is a very difficult gold standard for certain
areas of the world to aspire to. In order to solve that problem,
we have encouraged our suppliers, particularly in West Africa,
Central Africa, Indonesia and the Far East—I hope we have
not complicated things, but we have created another standard all
of our own[4]
where we have encouraged them to progress to FSC-certified. We
have said to them: "If you can prove to us through a third-party
audit that what you do is at least legal, then we will recognise
the improvement you make year on year, if you have a programme
that eventually gives us FSC-certified timber." We call that
"verified progress".
Q75 Mark Pritchard: IVP—your scheme
is called Independently Verified Progress.
Mr Fineman: Yes. We have enormous
trouble explaining to our customers what that is all about. It
is a significant challenge to us. In fact, we have enormous problems
explaining to our own staff what it is all about because it is
an immensely complicated—
Q76 Mark Pritchard: Can you elaborate
on the differences as you see it?
Mr Fineman: Between the different
standards?
Q77 Mark Pritchard: Yes, why you
have done it and then the difference between your own standard
and the FSC.
Mr Fineman: I would not say that
we had a standard. I know I have just said we have a standard,
but we try and take the recognised standards, and to that end
CPET has been extremely useful because it has certainly highlighted
some standards that are acceptable to the Government. We have
taken those standards and said: "We will honestly try and
pass those standards on as accurately as possible so that our
customers understand what they are buying. Once we have done that,
we then recognise that in certain areas of the world it is just
not possible to get to any of those standards, especially FSC,
overnight. You have to allow a period of, I would guess, anything
up to about six to 10 years before they are able to get to it[5].
Q78 Mark Pritchard: Do you think there
is an element perhaps of a danger of, if you like, standard clutter?
You mentioned that there are five or six credible schemes, and
yet you suggest that perhaps five or six are too many, and therefore
the public might be confused. Are you arguing for a single scheme;
and, if so, which of the five or six credible schemes should not
be around?
Mr Fineman: Well, a bit like the
FSC, I would absolutely love there to be one standard, or two
at the most. I recognise that cannot be the case. The way we cope
with that commercially is to try and convince our customers that
the brand of Timbmet Silverman stands for legal and sustainable
timber. If you mention those words to us, you will get a response
that supplies you with legal and sustainable timber, and we take
the complexity out of it from the customers' point of view. The
customer can take it to whatever level of sophistication that
they want to, but more often than not we are explaining to a customer
what it is all about; it is not the customer coming to us and
demanding a certain level of sustainability.
Mr Matthews: In relation to the
reality, for producers in Central & West Africa producing
hardwoods for the UK or European markets, there are two companies
that are on the verge of FSC certification—and one might
have just got it for a specific concession. Timbmet is looking
at those that are legal and working closely with the companies
that are prepared to move towards FSC, for example, the high standard,
and trying to ensure that there is a market for that product and
a way of encouraging those companies to continue along the road
to full certification. That is where the FLEGT process comes in,
and the CPET process, ensuring that markets for legal and sustainable
timber are growing in the UK and hopefully within the EU. The
difficulty is that to get to the FSC standard for African producers
is phenomenally challenging, and it is a long road. I know that
FSC are considering introducing an interim step, a step that can
be recognised between the high standard and those that have achieved
a legal level needs to be recognised. Again, CPET perhaps needs
to do that as well.
Q79 Mark Pritchard: Apart from the
sales invoices and trail of paperwork in procurement, physically
on the timber is there any stamp that would tell me that something
coming into port is sustainable; I can see it there, and it has
a red triangle or a leaf or whatever stamp on the end?
Mr Fineman: All the different
schemes have a trademark, and usually it is on a label on the
timber, not on the timber itself. It is on a label attached to
the timber.
3 Witness amendment: 34%-for sawn and machined
timber including independently verified product. Back
4
Witness addition: but bringing together NGO initiatives. Back
5
Witness amendment: although for Verified Progress, producers
working through the WWF Producer Groups and TFT have to get FSC
within five years. Back
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