History

Under Principle 9 for FSC certification, forest managers are required to identify any High Conservation Values (HCVs) that occur within their individual forest management units, to manage them in order to maintain or enhance the values identified, and to monitor the success of this management.

Following development of the concept in forest certification, including the idea of 'HCVF's or 'High Conservation Value Forests', the HCV concept has been applied both within the FSC system and more broadly within industry and governance. For example, the approach is increasingly being used by timber purchasers, land-use planners, conservation advocates, and within governmental and institutional policy debates.

This rapid uptake reflects the elegance of the concept, which has moved the debate away from definitions of particular forest types (e.g. primary, old growth) or methods of timber harvesting (e.g. industrial logging) to focus instead on the values that make a forest particularly important. This emphasis on values integrates the different contexts of forests, making the HCVF concept universally applicable. By identifying these key values and ensuring that they are maintained or enhanced, it is possible to make rational management decisions that are consistent with the protection of a forest area’s critically important environmental and social values.