Japan to Quantify Companies' Forest Conservation Efforts

Tokyo, Jan. 10 (Jiji Press)--Japan's Forestry Agency will introduce a system to quantify the environmental contributions made by companies engaged in forest conservation.

By making the contributions "visible," the agency aims to encourage corporate participation in forest conservation by making it easier for companies to gain recognition from customers and the market.

Specifically, the system will be adopted for a so-called profit-sharing afforestation program, where local governments and companies act as afforestation partners to manage national forests and share the revenue from selling harvested timber with the state.

The agency has been calling for corporate participation in the afforestation program. Companies that become afforestation partners take on roles such as planting trees, grass cutting and thinning.

However, since it takes around 50 years to grow trees to a usable timber size, participation has been higher among local governments than private companies.

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]