As defined in ISO 14001, an Environmental Management System (EMS) is a part of the overall management system that includes organisational structure, planning activities, responsibilities, practices, procedures, processes and resources for developing, implementing, achieving, reviewing and maintaining the environmental systems.

Essentially, an EMS is a structured, organisation-wide approach that enables a company of any size or type to address the environmental impacts of its activities, products and services. An EMS makes possible controlling environmental impacts and setting initiatives to improve environmental performance.

ISO 14000 standards

ISO 14000 is a series of voluntary generic standards developed / being developed by ISO that provides business management with the structure for managing environmental impacts. The standards include a broad range of environmental management disciplines, including the basic management system, auditing, performance evaluation, labelling and life cycle assessment.

Classified according to their focus, the standards fall into two categories.

1. Organisation or process standards - environmental management system (EMS), environmental auditing (EA) and environmental performance evaluation and

2. Product-oriented standards - life cycle assessment, environmental labelling and environmental aspects in product standards.