The Forest Stewardship Council GmbH (FSC) is an international non-profit, multistakeholder organization established in 1993 that promotes responsible management of the world's forests via timber certification. It is an example of a market-based used as a transnational environmental policy. Purpose The FSC's stated mission is to "promote environmentally appropriate, socially beneficial, and economically viable management of the world's forests". To this end, the body has published a global strategy with five goals: Advancing globally responsible forest management. Ensure equitable access to the benefits of FSC systems. Ensure integrity, credibility and transparency of the FSC system. Create business value for products from FSC certified forests. Strengthen the global network to deliver on goals 1 through 4. These goals are promoted, managed, and developed through six program areas: forests, chain of custody, social policy, monitoring and evaluation, quality assurance, and ecosystem services. It claims that forests managed to its standards offer benefits to both local and wider communities and these are said to include cleaner air and water, and a contribution to mitigating the effects of climate change. Directly or indirectly, FSC addresses issues such as illegal logging, deforestation and global warming and some reports indicate positive effects on economic development, environmental conservation, poverty alleviation, and social and political empowerment. Using the FSC logo supposedly signifies that the product comes from responsible sources—environmentally appropriate, socially beneficial and economically viable. The FSC label is used on a wide range of timber and non-timber products, from paper and furniture to medicine and jewelry, and aims to give consumers the option of supporting responsible forestry. History According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, half of the world's forests have already been altered, degraded, destroyed or converted into other land uses. Much of the remaining forests today suffer from illegal exploitation and otherwise poor management. FSC was established as a response to these concerns over global deforestation. Tropical deforestation as a global concern rose to prominence in the 1980s and can be somewhat attributed to a fight for action by environmentalists and northern countries over the need to protect tropical woodland. Prior to this, a number of other economic and regulatory mechanisms such as financial aid, policy frameworks and trade conventions were established in the fight against deforestation. These include the International Tropical Timber Agreement (1983), the Convention of International Trade on Endangered Species (1975) and the Global Environment Facility (1991). Despite