Miljømærkning og miljøstyring

Summary

 The scope of this project is to explore the possibilities and barriers for positive interaction between the EU regulations on environmental management (EMAS) and ecolabelling. This is elucidated both theoretically by investigation of administrative and documentary demands of the two systems and by collection of practical experience. This process has led to a number of recommendations that will ease the administrative work for both enterprises and authorities and documentary work for enterprises.

The applied method of the project has been to elaborate on previsous experience. First possibilities and barrieres for interaction were identified from the text of the regulations and procedures for application. Based on this, a questionnaire was drawn up which was used for in-depth interviews with 4 enterprises. Conclusions from these interviews were used to identify a number of topics that were discussed in a workshop where a greater number of enterprises participated. The conclusions from the workshop were used to draw up recommendations for enterprises and authorities.

The recommendations are based on that conclusion that a direct integration of the two systems into one is not possible. Positive interaction is, however, both possible and desirable and as a consequence the recommendations focus on a number of initiatives that authorities could establish or support in order to render it more attractive for enterprises to participate in the two systems. The recommendations focus on three areas: requirements in the two systems (e.g. emission limits from production processes in ecolabelling criteria, environmental goals related to the products in EMAS), the nature and amount of information available for companies (e.g. on the building up of systems) and the use of economical incentives.