BURLINGTON, VT -- The Boy Scouts of America received the Sustainable Forestry Initiative® (SFI®) President’s Award today for its leadership in embracing third-party forest certification and educating youth about the value of sustainable forest management.

“This is a natural partnership -- the Boys Scouts of America and SFI share both respect for our forests and a keen interest in showing youth the immense value of sustainable forest management,” said SFI President and CEO Kathy Abusow, who presented the award at the SFI annual conference. “The Boy Scouts are leading by example -- encouraging Scouts to explore and understand the multiple benefits of our forests and certifying their lands and their award-winning magazine to the SFI standard.”

“Scouting’s earliest history reflects the importance of teaching young people to understand and respect the environment,” said Bob Mazzuca, Chief Scout Executive for the Boy Scouts of America. “Being good stewards of the land is something everyone can and should support, and through SFI certification we can all learn how the forest contributes to our everyday life.”

The Boy Scouts of America supports sustainable forest management in many ways:
• Scouts can earn a Forestry merit badge by exploring the complexity of forests, learning about forest resources, and understanding the role people play in sustaining the health of forests.
• The Philmont Scout Ranch in New Mexico is certified to the SFI 2010-2014 Standard, and Boys’ Life magazine, with a circulation of 1.1 million, is printed on SFI chain-of-custody certified paper.
• The 2013 National Scout Jamboree at the Summit Bechtel Family National Scout Reserve in West Virginia will use wood from SFI-certified lands, showing the 45,000 Scouts, leaders, and staff expected to attend how careful planning can support wise use of forest resources while conserving other values.

SFI Inc. and the Society of American Foresters (SAF) teamed up at the 2010 National Scout Jamboree to provide an SAF patch that 5,000 Scouts earned by learning about forest management and wildlife, forest products, plant identification and invasive species, careers and education in forestry, and tree ring and wood/tree identification.

Two other awards were presented during the SFI 2011 annual conference:
• Lyme Timber Company of Hanover, NH, and the Wildlife Management Institute received the SFI Conservation Leadership Award for Biodiversity Research for an initiative that is improving forest habitat for the American woodcock in northern New York state.
• The 13th Annual SFI Implementation Committee Achievement Award went to the Mississippi committee for advancing logger training, building community partnerships, and raising awareness about the value of third-party forest certification.
Independent SFI Inc. manages the largest single third-party forest standard in the world, which is based on principles promoting sustainable forest management, including measures to protect water quality, biodiversity, wildlife habitat, species at risk, and Forests with Exceptional Conservation Value.

About SFI Inc.

SFI Inc. is an independent 501(c)(3) nonprofit charitable organization, and is solely responsible for maintaining, overseeing and improving the internationally recognized Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI) program. Across North America, more than 190 million acres/78 million hectares are certified to the SFI forest management standard, making it the largest single forest standard in the world. SFI chain-of-custody certification tells buyers the percentage of fiber from certified forests, certified sourcing and/or post-consumer recycled content. The SFI program’s unique fiber sourcing requirements promote responsible forest management on all suppliers’ lands. SFI Inc. is governed by a three-chamber board of directors representing environmental, social and economic sectors equally.

About the Boy Scouts of America

The Boy Scouts of America provides the nation’s foremost youth program of character development and values-based leadership training, which helps young people be “Prepared. For Life.™” The Scouting organization is composed of 2.7 million youth members between the ages of 7 and 21 and more than a million volunteers in nearly 300 local councils throughout the United States and its territories.

SOURCE: Sustainable Forest Initiative Inc.