ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS : A STUDY ON SMALL AND MEDIUM SIZED CONSTRUCTION ENTERPRISES

Abstract

More firms are starting to realise that it is imperative to implement International Organisation of Standardisation (ISO) 14000 in order to minimise environmental problems. For targeted environmental performance to be met, subcontractors’ involvement in environmental management systems (EMSs) is very important. The aim of this research study is to determine the stakeholders’ influence in shaping the direction of environmental management (EM) for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), and to evaluate effective strategies encouraging ISO 14000 implementation. It is hypothesized that the government plays a bigger role in engaging SMEs in ISO 14000. A survey research is conducted to fulfil the following research objectives; understanding the local SMEs’ views towards environmental protection, the benefits of their experience from implementing ISO 14000, the issues encountered in implementing ISO 14000, other stakeholders’ influence over EM aspects and, effective strategies for driving ISO 14000 adoption. Respondents generally regard environment concerns as a low priority. Benefits experienced from implementing ISO 14000 include legal compliance, improved company reputation and compliance with developers’ and main contractors’ requirements. Issues impeding ISO 14000 implementation are attributed to limited resources, complexity of ISO 14000 and insufficient support from contractors. Government is found to be the top influencer in EM aspects. Effective strategies which will encourage ISO 14000 implementation are incentives and technical guidance. Indirect strategies are needed to drive main contractors to enforce environmental requirements on subcontractors. In addition, direct strategies are useful for addressing SMEs’ concerns. The limitations of this paper include the lack of focus on other stakeholders’ perspectives on the issue of SMEs’ ISO implementation, as well as SMEs’ views on integrating ISO 14000 and ISO 9000.