FSC® certified paper is paper that has been harvested in a responsible manner. Although FSC certified paper often contains recycled paper, it does not have to contain it to be certified. The primary requirement for certification is being harvested and produced in a responsible manner.

FSC is an acronym for the Forest Stewardship Council®, which is an independent, non-governmental, not-for-profit organization that was established to promote the responsible management of the world’s forests. The FSC system provides an assurance that products such as wood and paper have been harvested in a socially and environmentally responsible manner. The FSC’s Chain of Custody certification provides a way in which the material can be tracked from the certified initial source through the manufacturing process to the end user.

For marketers and organizations that include environmental sustainability as an important part of their vendor selection process, the FSC designation is a great way to ensure that they are performing green printing.

Perfect is Forest Stewardship Council certified. This means we can acquire and print on paper stocks that are FSC certified. When we use a certified stock to produce a customer’s project, we can print the FSC logo on the piece to indicate that it was produced responsibly.

Print buyers need to be aware that any printer can print on paper that is FSC certified. However, only certified printers that are subject to annual audits and strict procedures may put the FSC logo on printed pieces. Frequently, customers specify a need for FSC paper but fail to ask for the logo to appear on their printed material. If the piece is printed by a printer that is not FSC certified, the customer has no way of knowing if the stock that was used was purchased and ultimately harvested from reliable sources.