JAY – Verso Paper Corp. has announced that its four paper mills have been independently audited and certified to the Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification chain of custody standard.

PEFC is the world’s largest forest certification system.

An independent, nonprofit, nongovernmental umbrella organization founded in 1999 to promote sustainably managed forests through third-party forest certification, PEFC assesses and mutually recognizes national forest certification systems. The 26 national certification systems currently endorsed by PEFC account for more than 500 million acres of certified forests on six continents that deliver millions of tons of certified wood fiber to the marketplace annually.

PEFC endorses the Sustainable Forestry Initiative® standard and the American Tree Farm System standard in the United States. Under mutual recognition agreements between PEFC and SFI, and between PEFC and ATFS, any wood fiber that comes from SFI-certified or ATFS-certified sources can be tracked, documented and certified to the PEFC chain of custody standard. The PEFC chain of custody standard offers on-product labeling options that will be available to Verso customers in early 2009. In addition, customers who are certified to the SFI chain of custody standard will be able to use Verso’s PEFC chain of custody-certified paper to meet SFI labeling requirements.