ATFS Standards Under Review
The ATFS Standards of Sustainability are the basis for the American Tree Farm System® (ATFS) program and must be met for a property to become a Tree Farm. These standards are under review in 2014 by the Independent Standards Review Panel (ISRP). To form the ISRP, the American Forest Foundation’s (AFF’s) Board of Trustees invited a representative cross-section of forestry community leaders and stakeholders with an interest in forest sustainability on small private forest ownerships in the United States. The ISRP includes representatives from academia, the conservation community, the forest industry, landowners, foresters, loggers, buyers and public forest agencies. The ISRP’s primary responsibility is to guide public review of the standards and, based on feedback from the public, make recommendations for appropriate modifications of the standards to AFF’s Board of Trustees. The public is invited to submit comments during two 60-day public review periods in 2014, one early in the year and a second, on a revised standard, in the summer. As an ATFS inspector, your comments are particularly valuable— so please take a moment to submit your feedback. Once enacted by AFF’s board, there will be a transition period, during the 2015 calendar year, to full implementation of the revised ATFS standards. At the conclusion of the transition period, all Tree Farms must comply with the new standards. During the transition period, ATFS will launch a training program in collaboration with state Tree Farm programs to ensure that all qualified Tree Farm Inspectors update their credentials to the new ATFS standards
