Environmental Management: Definition and Scope

Environmental Management (EM)

• According to Bartol & Martin (1998), Management is the process of achieving organizational goals through planning, organizing, leading, and controlling.
• Environmental Management (EM) is the coordination of resources like personnel, machinery, materials, and finances through planning, organizing, leading, and controlling to achieve predetermined organizational goals and objectives.

Definition of Environmental Management

• There is no single universal definition of EM due to the variety and broad scope of specializations
• It is the management function that seeks to handle environmental aspects of an organization
• Another definition is it is the management of the environmental performance of organizations, bodies, and companies (Sharratt, 1995)
• Environmental Management is the control of all human activities that significantly impact the environment.
• Environmental Management is a decision-making process which regulates the impact of human activities to sustain human development without impairing the environment's capacity.
• Environmental Management seeks the best environmental options to promote sustainable development.
• It is a formal, informal, private and public process where organizations use mechanisms to create cost-effective actions based on social preferences to maintain environmental quality, conservation, and enhancement of resources and ecosystems.

The Framework for Environmental Management

• Environmental Management addresses environmental problems through a five-step process:
• Recognizing and prioritizing environmental problems
• Developing appropriate environmental objectives
• Formulating environmental policies, by-laws, rules, strategies and actions
• Implementing and enforcing the formulated policies
• Evaluating the effectiveness and efficiency of these systems

Goals of Environmental Management

• Sustaining or improving existing resources
• Preventing and resolving environmental problems.
• Establishing institutions supporting research monitoring and management
• Providing warnings of threats while identifying opportunities
• Improving the quality of lives where possible
• Identifying new technologies or policies to mitigate environmental effects of development

Appropriate vs inappropriate Environmental Management

• Appropriate environmental management is achieved when resources are efficiently used for human development and conserved for their role in sustaining ecosystems.
• Inappropriate environmental management is the excessive misuse of resources through over or under-utilization alongside a failure to conserve them in order to maintain ecological functioning.

The Evolution of Environmental Consciousness: International Perspective

• Pre-1960s era
• The 1960s and 1970s:
• Environmental concerns were voiced in industrialized developed nations.
• Environmental concerns were regarded as western luxuries in most Developed countries
• Important issues raised include wildlife management, soil conservation, air and water pollution, land degradation and desertification

1972 Stockholm Conference on Human Development

• Held as a UN conference on the Human Environment which brought industrialized and developing nations together
• This was a major Global Environmental Conference
• A key message was that environment and development are integrated, like two sides of the same coin
• A declaration was signed by 72 countries
• Led to many countries establishing Environmental Ministries
• Led to the establishment of UNEP

Other Evolution points

• UNEP was established in 1975
• WCED was commissioned to formulate "a global agenda for change"
• WCED 1987 Report (Brundtland report) popularized the concept Sustainable Development and developed guiding principles for it.
• Rio summit of 1992 (Earth Summit) tried to operationalize Sustainable Development including the Agenda 21, with 115 chapters focusing on poverty reduction.
• Rio+10 (Earth summit 2002) took place at the Johannesburg summit in South Africa.
• Rio+20 (Rio 2012) was held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, as a UN conference on Sustainable Development.
• World Environment Day is celebrated every year on 5th June

The Evolution of Environmental Consciousness: National Perspective

• Pre-1970s
• EPC (1974) - NRC Decree 239
• EPA (EPA Act 490 of 1994)
• EPA (EPA Act 490 of 1994) was given the responsibility to regulate the environment and to ensure the implementation of governments policy on the environment.
• The functions of EPA Now should be known

More Evolution points

• Focus has shifted to integrating environmental concerns with economic growth.
• The initial idea that the environment constrained economic growth is shifting towards the understanding that economic development requires respecting the functions of the ecosystem.

Lessons

• Environmental problems have global ramifications from local causes
• Environmental issues have socio-economic implications
• Evidence of the severity of some environmental problems has emerged
• There is a need for international cooperation in solving environmental problems

Future Trends

• Leading companies in advanced countries are adding environmental issues to add value to their business.
• Many organizations, mostly in developing countries, focus on environmental management and need to go ahead to integrate environmental concerns in their business strategy
• The trend is that organizations acknowledge the business implications of dealing with environmental matters as a strategic concern
• Concerns deemed strategic in business—manufacturing, quality, cost, distributions and services—with environmental components are treated as part of business plans and managed accordingly.
• There is a move away from managers acting as if environmental staff alone are accountable for environmental performance, towards integrating environmental management into overall corporate planning.

Importance of Environmental Management

• Well-being and human health are linked to the environment
• Mismanagement leads to Deterioration in human health eg pollution
• Efficiency can lead to minimization of cost of production
• Governmental influence (environmental legislation), eg EPA_ΕΙΑ
• Industries protect the environment for competitive advantage
• Increases in population requires managing the environment to meet future needs
• Sustainability of resources for development requires environmental management
• Disaster management is part of environmental management to identify and study causes and effects of disasters for early warning systems.
• Environmental management can help to prevent the emission of gases into the atmosphere (e.g. Kyoto Protocol on environmental mgt)
• It ensures peace prevails in the society.