Following the announcement made on the 05/07/2024, Eswatini is continuing with the development of a national forest certification standard. In doing so it is joining South Africa as part of a regional forest certification programme, under the banner of SAFAS (Sustainable African Forest Assurance Scheme).  The scheme is open to applications from countries in the SDC region.  SAFAS aims to have its regional scheme endorsed by the PEFC (Programme for Endorsement of Forest Certification) 

The working group for the revision of the SAFAS Forest Management standard invites you to participate in the process by commenting on the Enquiry Draft Forest Management Standard.  (Attached below)

It would be greatly appreciated if you could study the attached enquiry draft and provide feedback or suggestions for improvement. Most of the focus should be at the indicator level, but if you suggest improvements to the criteria, verifiers, guidance or any other part of the standard, these will be taken into account as well.  You can record your comments on the template provided.  All comments made will be considered, noted, and a report drafted explaining how the comments were handled by the Working Group will be circulated to stakeholders.

The deadline for comments is Monday the 30^th of July 2025.  Please don’t wait until the last minute to send comments.  It will immensely help if the comments are received as early as possible. 

If you have any questions about the standard and/or the revision process, please don’t hesitate to reach out. 

Send back the completed comments template to admin@safas.org We look forward to receiving your inputs.