The ISO 14001 series of international standards was developed to incorporate environmental consciousness into an organisation’s operations and product standards. The standard specifies requirements for establishing an environmental policy and implementing procedures that promote an ongoing reduction of environmental loads stemming from production activities, products and services.
Shuichi Tsukahara, Canon Australia managing director, says, “Many imbalances in our world seek to hinder kyosei. We actively strive to resolve these imbalances through our commitment to the environment, both in our products and in our work practices.
“Rather than secure certification for our business operations as a whole, we’re proud to have committed to individual certification for each of our branches and operations. It is important to Canon that we continue to set a leadership position in our environmental standards.”
David McCulloch, Canon Australia Procurement & Facilities general manager, and Canon Environmental Committee chairman, says, “Canon focused on three key areas: the impact of our physical premises; our logistics management and the disposal of our products after customers replace them.
“Our environmental management system ensures we now recycle more of our waste products, such as paper and cardboard, to reduce the amount of rubbish going to landfill. We’ve introduced some new work practices and upgraded our facilities to reduce energy consumption in our offices – for example the energy savings in our North Ryde head office alone have resulted in a reduction of almost 350 tonnes of harmful CO2 emissions.”
Canon has invested two years in achieving certification across their entire Australia operation, beginning early in 2002 with an extensive environmental audit-training program for a core team of Canon staff and managers. The team subsequently analysed systems and procedures across Canon’s entire Australian operations to ensure each aspect of the business minimised its impact on the environment where possible by practicing sustainable development.
Independent external experts will re-audit Canon annually as organisations need to show continuous improvement in order to retain the certification.
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