AHA is being implemented in two phases:
AHA’s web portal is being developed for registered users that, in the first instance, when launched by 15 September 2025, will be U.S. hardwood exporters, to provide access to AHA’s deforestation risk data at state and county level, alongside the results of AHA-endorsed JRAs.
AHA’s portal will provide a simple and user-friendly mechanism by which U.S. hardwood exporters can prepare, with each individual consignment for onward sale, a due diligence statement containing summary data, and links to relevant documentation, on the legal and deforestation-free status of U.S. hardwoods. The portal will automate the gathering and entry of standard due diligence data including the exporter’s name and address, product description (harmonised system code, free-text description, trade name and full scientific name of the species) and product quantity.
Using drop-down lists and point-and-click maps, AHA’s portal will allow exporters to generate a file containing geolocations of all counties from which hardwood contained in the consignment may have derived. This will be a geoJson file conforming to the WGS84 coordinate standard and EPSG:4326 projection as required by EUDR.
During 2026, AHA’s portal will be integrated with a Proof of Provenance (PoP) procedure to guarantee the legal and deforestation-free origin of U.S. hardwoods. The web portal will be extended to accommodate registered users, both upstream and downstream of U.S. hardwood exporters, and to allow them to convey due diligence data through the supply chain. Blockchain technology will be used to ensure the integrity of data transfer via the web portal, and appropriate encryption technologies will be employed to ensure data security and commercial confidentiality. The web portal will be linked with a surveillance system drawing on plant-chemistry-based technology to ensure integrity of claims.
Under the AHA PoP procedure, primary hardwood processors and exporters of logs and other unprocessed hardwood material in the U.S. registered on the system shall use the web portal to determine: (a) the risk of illegal harvesting in the specific states where they source timber; and (b) the risk of hardwood forest land being converted to agriculture in the specific counties where they source timber. Where risks are specified, primary hardwood processors and exporters of logs and other unprocessed hardwood shall mitigate these risks in their future procurement activity for any products they wish to sell bearing AHA’s legal and deforestation-free claim.
AHA is cooperating with the U.S. Forest Service International Programs’ Wood Identification and Screening Center (WISC) and other international agencies in work to develop plant-chemistry based testing procedures to identify harvest location of finished forest products. Lab-based techniques include Stable Ratio Isotope Analysis (SIRA) and Trace Element Analysis (TEA). Another technique known as Laser-induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) may allow testing of finished products on-site, using portable hand-held devices.
All these techniques require the prior establishment of comprehensive databases of timber samples covering a variety of commercial species from across the U.S. hardwood production area. The larger and more representative the database, the higher the resolution and confidence of the provenance test. The process of building the database and refining the testing techniques may take up to two years, but when ready, will provide an extremely robust method to ensure the integrity of AHA-labelled products, while also reducing the need for more traditional chain of custody audit checks.
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