The following is the second in a two-part series on Cleaning Up The Mess, prepared by European Union office in Port-of-Spain, headed up by Stelios Christopoulos, Chargé d'Affaires, Delegation of the European Union, written exclusively for Guardian Medias Cleaning Up The Mess series. Eco-Management and Audit Scheme is the most advanced environmental management scheme presently available. EMAS has become a popular standard used by Europeans to assess the environmental performance of other organisations.
The core elements of EMAS are:
1. Performance: The environmental performance of a company is improved by its commitment to evaluate and improve its environmental impact.
2. Credibility: Independent auditors must verify and guarantee the value of both the actions taken and information disclosed by those companies involved in the scheme.
3. Transparency: Environmental statements made by companies serve to keep stakeholders informed about the operations and performance of those companies vis-à-vis the impact of their businesses on the environment.
EMAS introduced to T&T
In a bid to improve the environmental performance and therefore competitiveness of SME's across T&T, the Delegation of the European Union in collaboration with JARIC Environment, Safety and Health Services brought together a group of SME's from across T&T to learn about EMAS. Speaking to the group was EMAS expert, Heinz-Werner Engel, a German-born environmental auditor who has been active in the environmental field for the past 35 years. He is considered one of the world's leading experts on environmental management systems and small business applications.
About the need for programmes such as EMAS, Engel stated "Traditionally, the European regulators tried to achieve environmental compliance through the imposition of strict rules and regulations; however, regulators soon discovered that even strict enforcement could not reverse the environmental trends. "They therefore began to explore other kinds of tools above and beyond the regulations that could be applied, thus they began to work on the development of market-based tools such as eco-labelling for products and voluntary agreements... EMAS is a kind of eco-label not put on a product, but on a system," Engel said.
EMASeasy
Recognising the most significant barriers to implementation of environmental management systems-time, cost and human resources-Engel developed EMASeasy, a programme specially targeted to small and micro enterprises that want to implement environmental management programmes. EMASeasy helps companies to manage environmental issues, but cuts down on the bureaucracy, time and resources that would normally need to be allocated, while also allowing the organisation the opportunity to win certification to ISO 14001, or registration to EMAS 1.
The key to this approach is clustering. Companies can offer to help, or gain support from, others in the cluster and thus cut back on cost and time and share resources based on a simple theme: "Ten people, ten pages, ten days." The workshop gave the 12 SMEs participating insight into the process and opens the door to the application of the system for the first time into T&T. As a sponsor of the workshop, the European Union Delegation T&T, participated by conducting one of the workshop modules introducing attendees to EMAS, the EU experience.
EMAS benefits
Given that the implementation of EMAS is voluntary, then why would a company devote capital, time and resources to it? The most important answer is, of course, to remain competitive and win new business with new classes of socially conscious consumers/clients, but there are other reasons to implement EMAS as well:
1. Resource savings and lower costs through for example lower energy, water consumption. Better office materials (e.g. paper, ink) and equipment management; better recycling and waste disposal can also lead to important cost savings.
2. Improved efficiency-Implementation of an environmental management system can also reveal and help to correct inefficiencies inherent in various organizational activities.
3. Better legislative compliance and lower financial burden due to remediation, clean-ups and penalties for breaches.
4. Improved workplace quality, better employee morale and incentive to team building
5. Improved stakeholder relations
6. Opportunity to learn best practices from other (Green) organisations.