The fully updated and expanded ForestMapper has more detailed forest datasets, improved spatial accuracy, and a new interface. For our partners, there is information on pulp mill risk indicators, country level risk summaries, as well as new Next Gen information to help identify opportunities for fibre diversification.

ForestMapper was developed to give Canopy’s partners clearer visibility into forest-sourcing risk. It shows supplier proximity to ecologically critical landscapes, helping companies better understand risk tied to Ancient and Endangered Forests. It also highlights opportunities to diversify your fibre basket through spatial mapping of pulp mill locations by fibre type, and helps focus due diligence and supplier engagement where they matter most.

ForestMapper is for companies that use forest pulp for paper, paper packaging, and MMCF fabrics, to help them identify Ancient and Endangered Forests globally. It will also be of interest to producers, mills, and investors.

ForestMapper shows the global extent of Ancient and Endangered Forests by integrating geospatial maps of a broad suite of ecological characteristics, including Primary Forests and Intact Forest Landscapes. It overlays the geographic location of pulp mills and assesses potential risk indicators in order to provide companies with quantitative and actionable insights on forest-sourcing risks.

• Areas with documented and/or known social risk.
• Indigenous, First Nations, and forest communities’ territorial rights and territories.
• Areas proposed for protection or in the process of receiving protected status.
• Direct traceability information on mill sourcing or supply chain relationships.
• Instructions for what should happen on the land.

ForestMapper is not a compliance tool and does not determine whether a supplier, mill, or product meets the requirements of regulations. Dedicated traceability and compliance, such as those provided by Preferred by Nature or other dedicated traceability and compliance providers are better suited for regulatory reporting and verification.

What ForestMapper does provide is a science-based view of forest sourcing risk that complements and informs regulatory due diligence. For example, if a mill in your supply chain is located near a Primary Forest, that is not automatically an EUDR violation, but it is a signal that further due diligence and supplier engagement may be warranted.

Think of ForestMapper as an early-warning tool that helps prioritize where deeper due diligence is needed — not as a tool that definitively demonstrates regulatory compliance.

ForestMapper helps companies:

• Understand where Ancient and Endangered Forests may intersect with their supply chains.
• Identify areas where sourcing requires deeper due diligence.
• Prioritize supplier engagement based on potential ecological risk.
• Support sustainability commitments and responsible sourcing decisions.
• Identify geographically relevant fibre diversification solutions. 

Many companies choose to adopt sustainability commitments that go beyond minimum regulatory requirements to address additional business exposure, ecological values, and stakeholder expectations. ForestMapper supports those commitments by helping identify potential sourcing risks that may not be evident through compliance screening alone.

• ForestMapper presents an aggregation of best-available science so decision makers will not have to cross reference multiple other maps. As a result, ForestMapper improves data accuracy and resolution to create a more robust, comprehensive, and credible global picture of where forest risk may exist.
• ForestMapper is a practical, science-based tool that can help visualize sourcing risk, support sustainability commitments, and strengthen market access conversations.

While there are many other mapping tools that give broad landscape intelligence and real-time monitoring across forests and other land systems, ForestMapper is tailored to quantify exposure risk directly at the Canopy policy level for our partners. By evaluating the intersection of a wide range of ecologically critical forest types with sourcing infrastructure and supplier geographies, it helps companies prioritize due diligence and supplier engagement efforts with quantitative, brand-specific risk indicators. The integration of pulp mill locations and trade data also uniquely offers companies a sign post for Next Gen and recycled fibre diversification opportunities in strategically relevant sourcing landscapes.

Further, ForestMapper is designed to synthesize existing data on the ecological qualities underpinning the Ancient and Endangered Forest framework, rather than producing new datasets directly. It thus benefits from complementary tools, such as Global Forest Watch and the Global Safety Net, by aggregating best available open access data layers and customizing their application to forest values that matter most to the implementation of Canopy sourcing policies.