Every organization aims to contribute to the important pillar of environment sustainability. To achieve that, it must conform to an international standard that specifies the requirements of the environment management system used by the organization for enhancing its environment responsibility and performance. After the global acceptance of ISO 9000 and the sudden rise of environmental standards around the globe, the International Standards Organization (ISO) understood the need for an international environment standard. ISO 14001 standard is a globally accepted environment management standard conceptualized in 1996 to primarily honor the GATT negotiations and the 1992 Rio Summit. The latest version ISO 14001:2015 is an organized framework that manages the environmental impacts of an organization’s processes, products, and services on an immediate as well as, long-term basis. ISO’s commitment to adopt the best practices encourages reviewing of their standards regularly.
ISO 14001:2015 is responsive to the recent trends like familiarization of factors that benefit environmental sustainability such as climatic volatility. ISO 14001:2015 applies to any organization irrespective of their type, size, and nature of business. It also applies to the organization’s influence and control over its products, services, and activities from an environmental perspective. However, please note that ISO 14001:2015 does not declare any specific environmental performance benchmark.
ISO 14001:2015 standard implementations can benefit your organization in more ways than one. They are as follows:
1) Greater involvement and commitment from the senior management and leadership team.
2) Align your organization’s strategic direction and goals with the principles of environment management.
3) Significantly improve environmental accomplishments by reducing wastage, preserving natural resources, and saving costs.
4) Enhance risk/opportunity management for continuous systematic improvement and improve life-cycle management for identifying specific product enhancements.
5) By complying with legislation requirements, ISO 14001:2015 helps cut down the risk of fines and negative publicity.
6) Offers you a clear and consistent competitive advantage in the marketplace.
7) Improves corporate social responsibility to meet your supply chain requirements.
8) Improved upstream and downstream communication flow driven by an effective communication strategy.
9) Enhanced employee inducement and engagement via efficient processes.
10) Improves environment performance of your organization.
Conclusion: 20 years since it’s inception, ISO 14001 is still the most widely implemented environment standard in the world. The revised version ISO 14001:2015 will help organizations seamlessly integrate their strategic planning with environment management system for a much improved environmental performance.
