Standards were also improved or clarified to address comprehensive water-quality protections, the conservation of biological diversity, indigenous peoples' rights, and forest tree biotechnology. The forest area certified to the SFI Forest Management Standard now exceeds 250 million acres (100 million hectares) (SFI, 2015b). The process to develop a standard in Cameroon has progressed to the public consultation phase, one of the final steps before a standard is submitted for PEFC endorsement (PEFC, 2015b). The PEFC continues to work to expand forest certification opportunities in South America, including by convening a PEFC regional conferenceand workshop in Uruguay in April 2015 to bring together South American PEFC members, national system experts and stakeholders with other countries in the region who are interested in developing their own certification systems (PEFC, 2015c).