Print industry-based environmental certification is under way
Final stage negotiations are underway with state governments across Australia as the printing industry prepares to launch its own environmental certification system known as Printing Industries' Environmental Principles (PIEP).
The multi-level system has been under development by the Printing Industries Association of Australia for more than 18 months.
It will allow printing companies of all sizes to select an appropriate certification level tailored to company size and industry sector and supported by an accredited management system.
Printing Industries CEO Philip Andersen said that while negotiations with all the relevant state governments are being finalised, pilot testing of the system was underway in Queensland with a group of Printing Industries member companies.
"Our pilot group is working in conjunction with the Queensland Government's Environmental Protections Agency to identify any issues needing attention before PIEP is released nationally to the printing industry," he said.
Andersen said PIEP (a working title) was developed on the principle that one size does not fit all, and ISO 14001 was not necessarily right for every Australian print company.
"Adoption of ISO 14001 is an exhausting task for most printers seeking certification. It usually takes two or more years to fully implement and the cost of maintaining certification is also often prohibitive. A number of manufacturing industry sectors, such as the foundry industry, have developed their own ISO 14001 version using the similar environmental risks and management controls across that sector.
"As the printing industry is divided into many sectors where the activities are similar, Printing Industries considered there was scope to develop a specific printing industry environmental management system."
Andersen said the printing industry had a long history of undertaking environmental initiatives such as recycling, reducing emissions to water, land, air and generally improving environmental performance.
"Increasingly stringent and complex environmental legislation, along with greater community expectations, require printers to not only perform well in the environmental field, but also be able to demonstrate that required performance levels are being achieved.
"Additionally, customers now demand that printers provide advice on their level of environmental achievement.
"PIEP has been designed to achieve these objectives. If companies want to go further with ISO 14001 accreditation, PIEP will be instrumental in getting them there," he said.
PIEP has been developed to:
• Make environmental management accessible to all printers;
• Provide a stepped approach to environmental management for printers;
• Improve the environmental performance of the printing industry; and in turn,
• Improve the image of the industry to an increasingly environmentally conscious public;
• Enable customers and stakeholders to distinguish between the environmental performances of printers; and
• Promote competition between Australian printers to achieve higher levels of performance, especially when considering international competitors.
He said difficulties with the complexity and workload of ISO 14001 could make it unattractive for many printers to adopt fully – particularly for small and medium-sized printers.
"ISO 14001 provides a skeletal management system, which requires each organisation to identify risks and then develop its own risk control measures. The costs and resources required to undertake internal research to identify such risks and their control measures under ISO 14001 can be considerable.
"Such costs can be substantially reduced by identifying common areas of key risks to the printing industry sector and then supplying a recommended set of control measures to manage those risks.
"This is what PIEP seeks to do," Andersen said.
PIEP will deliver environmental solutions to businesses by:
• Providing a simplified, industry specific environmental management program, that gives printers the flexibility to achieve the level of environmental management, and certification most appropriate to them;
• Issuing standard sets of environmental risk areas for printers;
• Offering standard sets of control measures to cover printing industry risk areas to a satisfactory level;
• Presenting key performance indicators for printers, to assist in a range of compliance matters and to excel in environmental performance.
Andersen said that in addition to endorsement by state governments across Australia, Printing Industries was also hopeful of being able to secure funding from the respective governments to minimise the cost to its members and put it within the reach of all.