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by Felicia Weerawardena

ISO - The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) is a worldwide federation of national standards bodies from 150 countries of which Sri Lanka Standards Institution is one such body. The first ISO standard was published in 1951, with the title, Standard reference temperature for industrial length measurement.

Since then ISO has prepared standards numbering over fourteen thousand in various fields, including the popular ISO 9000 Quality Management System Standards and ISO 14000 Environmental Management System Standards.

Mission of ISO - The mission of ISO is to promote the development of standardization and related activities in the world with a view to facilitating the international exchange of goods and services, and developing cooperation in the spheres of intellectual, scientific, technological and economic activity.

ISO standards contribute to make life simpler and to increase the reliability and effectiveness of the goods and services we use by harmonization.

Technical Committee (TC) - For the purpose of developing standards, ISO has established Technical Committees pertaining to different subjects. ISO/TC 207 Technical Committee on Environmental Management was established to address environmental issues.

As a result, the ISO 14000 family of standards on Environmental Management was developed to provide a practical toolbox to assist in the implementation of actions supportive to sustainable development.

Harmonization - Today's free market economies increasingly encourage diverse sources of supply and provide opportunities for expanding market.

In such a situation the existence of non-harmonized standards in different countries could leave room for trade barriers. The answer is harmonization of standards by ISO resulting in global standards paving the way for a compatible technology worldwide.

Environment is defined by ISO as surroundings in which an organization operates, including air, water, land, natural resources, flora, fauna, humans and their interrelation. ISO 14000 family of standards on Environmental Management Systems (EMS) consist of twenty (20) standards, which are listed below:

ISO 14001: Environmental Management Systems - Specification with guidance for use

ISO 14004: Environmental Management Systems - General guideline on principles, systems and supporting techniques

ISO 14020 series: Environmental labels and declarations (Eco-labelling) (04 standards)

ISO 14030 series: Environmental performance evaluation (02 standards)

ISO 14040 series: Product life-cycle series (07 standards)

ISO 14050: Environmental management - vocabulary

ISO/TR 14061: Information to assist forestry organizations in the use of EMS Standards and ISO 14001 and ISO 14004

ISO/TR 14062: Environmental management - Integrating environmental aspects into product design and development

ISO 19011: Guidelines for quality and/or Environmental Management Systems-auditing

ISO 14063: Environmental communication

Environmental Management System - ISO 14001 specifies requirements for an EMS that may be objectively audited for self-declaration, second or third party certification/registration purposes.

ISO 14004 provides guidance to an organization to establish and implement an EMS, including guidance that goes beyond the requirements. Both ISO 14001 and ISO 14004 help an organization to establish a new or improve an existing Environmental Management System.

Eco-labelling - ISO 14020 series of environmental labelling (eco-labelling) standards provides general principles which serves as a basis for the development of ISO guidelines and standards on environmental claims and declarations which are of three types.

Eco-labelling provides a guarantee that the inputs which go into the product/service are environmentally friendly and that environmental impacts are minimal. ISO 14030 series of standards gives environmental performance indicators which serve as a guidance to evaluate the environmental performance of EMS.

Life-cycle assessment - ISO 14040 series of standards is on life- cycle assessment (LCA) of products and services.

It provides general principles, framework and methodological requirements for LCA study, guidance for determining the goal and scope of LCA study and for conducting a life-cycle inventory, guidance for conducting the life-cycle impact assessment phase of an LCA study, guidance for the interpretation of results from an LCA Study, information regarding the formatting of data to support LCA and also provide examples that illustrate how to apply the guidance in ISO 14001 and ISO 14041, ISO 14042.

Forestry and environmental design - ISO/TR 14061 provides information to assist forestry organizations in the use of the EMS standards ISO 14001 and ISO 14004. ISO/TR 14062 envisages the integration of environmental aspects into product design and development.

ISO 14063 provides guidelines and examples on environmental communications, and ISO 19011 provides guidelines for quality and/or environmental management systems auditing.

Green house gases - ISO/TC 207 is working towards its way for Green House Gas accounting and verification. Its goal is to provide a set of unambiguous verifiable requirements or specifications to support organisations of Green House Gas emission reduction projects.

Think globally - act locally - When it comes to environment especially the well-known credo Think globally - act locally becomes a reality. This expresses the objective of ISO's, many environmental standards.

One has to think of the environment globally and work towards minimizing environmental pollution by complying to the local legislation when environmental activities are carried out.

The ISO 14000 series of environmental standards reflect global consensus and good environmental practice in the international context that can be applied practically by organizations all over the world in their particular situation by conforming to local environmental regulations.

Facilitating trade - Business today is not just about selling a product or a service to a customer around the corner. In the rapid evolution to a global market - place, having a set of common rules is critical to facilitating trade.

At the same time, these rules have to be flexible enough to be as applicable to any company worldwide. Increasingly in the single world market, an organization needs to be able to demonstrate sound business management that includes concern for the environment.

There is growing evidence that this result in advantages in financing, insurance, marketing, regulatory and other areas of operation. An environmental management system provides a solid framework for meeting environmental challenges and realizing the above benefits.

Implementation tools - The Environmental Management System (EMS) of an organization is certified against ISO 14001 and other standards in the family serve as tools assisting in the implementation of the EMS.

ISO 14001 has proven to be a useful tool to evolve from maintaining regulatory compliance to a position of improved productivity and enhanced competitiveness.

ISO 14001 is a framework that inspires and channels the creativity of all members of an organization making them active agents of change promoting environmental protection, resource conservation, minimization of waste and disposal costs, utilization of recoverable resources and improved process efficiency.

Value addition -In today's context these would certainly add value to your business. Associated with these tangible economic benefits are distinct environment and economic components of sustainable development.

Businesses should try to get the maximum benefits by implementing these environmental standards which would result in the conservation of resources including energy, generation of less waste and therefore reduced treatment costs, minimization of environmental impacts which would give a better return on investment.

Minimization of environmental pollution would certainly have a positive societal impact resulting in a green environment.

(The writer is Standards/Testing Officer, Sri Lanka Standards Institution)

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