ISO 14000

By:Tarun Gupta(09502924) Raghav Chawla(09502905)

The International Organization of Standardization (ISO) is a private, nongovernmental, international standards body which promotes international harmonization and Development of manufacturing, product, and communications standards. It has 16000 standards applying to three areas of sustainable development: environmental, economic and social.

Implementing and Maintaining ISO 14000

The project planning includes scheduling, budgeting, assigning personnel, responsibilities, and resource, and if requires retaining specialized external assistance .

Next, an initial review of the organizations existing environmental program is needed once the initial review is completed, a strategic or implementation plan can be developed. Objective of the organization need to be determined and specific target set, Once the target and objective are set the organization need to be implemented.
Once the EMS is implemented, its progress need to be continually measured and monitored. Routine measurement and monitoring must be undertaken of the activities which have been identified as having the potential for a significant impact on the environment. An organizations EMS is not a stagnant system but must continually evolve to meet the organizations ever changing needs.

Similarities and Differences of ISO 14000 and ISO 9000

Structurally, the ISO 14000 and ISO 9000 standards have much in common. Both require written plans, although ISO 14001 calls for environmental planning that includes legal and other requirements, objective and targets, and environmental management programs. In the area of implementation and operation, the ISO 9001 standard includes requirements for organization, training, quality systems procedures, and document and data control. The biggest addition to the ISO 14001 standard is for emergency preparedness and response. Both standards are similar in their requirements for checking and corrective action, management review, and internal auditing.

Managements responsibilities are more extensive under ISO 14001. The standard includes the drafting of an environmental policy, consideration of environmental aspects in all management activities, setting environmental objectives and targets, establishment of an external communication procedure (described later), and development of a management review process for environment-related matters. If your business is already registered to ISO 9001, you probably have 75 to 80 percent of the management structure in place to conform to the ISO 14001 standard. What remains to be accomplished is the planning and implementation of environmental objectives and targets.

Local government in Japan adopts ISO 14000 and ISO 9000

The rapid adoption of ISO 14000, and subsequently ISO 9000, by government entities eager to bring about fiscal and organizational reforms in the wake of the bursting of the bubble economy , and their willingness to help rapid implementation of the ISO management systems in the small to medium enterprise sector.

 Barely a year after publication of ISO 14001 in 1997,

one Japanese local government had already achieved the first public entity certification

By the end of 2001, some 300 Japanese local

governments had achieved ISO 14001 certification

ISO 9000 began to interest local governments mainly

as a means of responding to the fiscal crisis caused by the bursting of the bubble economy

Conclusions
The increasing willingness of over 3 000 local governments in Japan to install modern quality and environmental management systems in their own organizations, and to provide financial help and training skills to encourage the SME sector to do likewise must be seen as very positive steps towards higher customer satisfaction and economic recovery.