The Living Forests Project was established in 1995 running for three years. The forest owners and the forest industries took the project initiative back in 1994.

The background for establishing the project was the increased international focus on forest and environmental issues, e.g. within the market, as well as the desire within Norwegian forestry to practice responsible forest management in a long-term perspective.

Living Forests has had a budget of NOK 30 million, or almost EURO 3,5 million, of which half was financed by forest owners and forest industries, and the rest by the Norwegian Government.

13 stakeholders representing economic, environmental, social and cultural interests, including forest owners, forest industries, trade unions, government and consumer-, environmental- and outdoor recreational organisations, participated in the process and contributed to the final consensus on the Living Forests Standards, 27 March 1998.

The main objectives of Living Forests:

• To help create Norwegian and international confidence in the raw materials from the Norwegian forest industry being based on sustainable and environmentally friendly Norwegian forest management
  
• To demonstrate the will and ability of Norwegian forestry to conduct long-term, sustainable resource management through R & D, competence building and information

The consensus on the Living Forests Standards was based on a thorough and comprehensive development process.

Living Forests followed a defined strategy by first concentrating the work on defining how to manage Norwegian forests sustainable, and thereafter addressing the documentation issue.

The development of the Living Forests Standards is based on research projects, test area results from various parts of Norway and thorough studies, to put forward recommendations based on science and facts on how to manage Norwegian forests sustainable.

This work went on for two and a half years, resulting in comprehensive standard documents for 25 standard areas, presenting alternative performance level standards for each standard area, and an analysis balancing economic, ecological and social consequences for each alternative performance level standard.

The standard documents were openly distributed and discussed by the 160 members of the Living Forests Advisory Committee in January 1998. Constructive comments were given on the quality of the documents and based on this input, the documents were further elaborated.

The Living Forests Standard are based on the six 'Helsinki Criteria' (the Pan-European Criteria for Sustainable Forest Management), and the 'Helsinki Indicators' are included among the 95 Living Forests Indicators.

Distribution of information on a broad basis to a wide range of stakeholder organisations and others, has been emphasised throughout the project to keep the Living Forests process transparent.

Living Forests has published newsletters and fact sheets in Norwegian, English and German. A number of reports have also been published, giving a more comprehensive description of the basis for the Living Forests Standards, the background for certification as well as the outcome of the project.

I.e.:

Report 9a-d: 

Report 11: 

Report 12: 

Living Forests has its own Internet homepage: http://www.levendeskog.no

The Living Forests Standards are directed towards the individual forest owner, being the responsible decision-maker.

Since its very beginning, the Living Forests project has believed in competence building as a key to successful implementation of the Living Forests Standards in Norwegian forest management. Living Forests has taken the initiative to study courses about bio-diversity and multiple use of forests. More than 500 forestry officers were updated on these issues.

Since the beginning of the 1990s, a large number of Norwegian forest owners participated in various study programmes. Approximately 15 000 forest owners, together with forest workers and

contractors have followed the study programme "The Richer Forest", and more than 6 000 have

participated in the follow-up study programme "Biological Diversity in Forests". Living Forests supported these ongoing initiatives in various ways.

In February 1999, a new study programme presenting the Living Forests Standards was launched. Approximately 1 000 forest owners, forest workers and contractors are already following this study programme.

In 1997, the Certification Committee was appointed by the Living Forests Steering Committee in agreement with the Norwegian environmental- and outdoor recreational organisations. The Committee had representatives from economic (3), ecological (3) and social (3) stakeholder groups.

The Certification Committee agreed upon a final consensus report 30 June 1998. The report draws up several group-certification schemes for small-scaled family forestry in Norway, and describes how the Living Forests Standards can be followed, both in connection with the ISO and EMAS environmental management systems, as well as the FSC system.

In 1996, the Living Forests initiated and was deeply involved in an international study on the competitive climate for wood products and paper packaging, focusing on the promotion of sound use of wood and other forest products. The study was performed by the Subgroup Substitution Project of the Joint FAO/ECE Team of Public Relations Specialists in the Forest and Forest Industries sector with the overall objective to promote increased international co-operation within the sector. The study was chaired by Norway, and finalised autumn 1998.

The Living Forests project has resembled a meeting place, where not only the project results, but the process itself has been a part of the challenge and target. The main challenge ahead is implementing the Living Forests Standards in practical forest operations, to ensure that sustainable forest management is conducted in Norway.