GEMI publishes new ISO 14001:2015 Self-Assessment Checklist Tool helps sustainability professionals quickly assess an organization's management practices according to the latest ISO 14001 updates

WASHINGTON, Oct. 5, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Global Environmental Management Initiative (GEMI), a global leader in developing insights, networking and creating collaborative sustainability solutions for business, today released a new edition of its GEMI ISO 14001:2015 Self-Assessment Checklist to reflect the 2015 revisions to the ISO 14001 Environmental Management System standard. The checklist enables a rapid self-assessment of an organization or facility to determine how closely existing management practices and procedures correspond to the elements of the standard.

GEMI produced its original checklist in 1996 to help interested companies understand the requirements of the new-at-the-time ISO 14001 standard, an internationally recognized approach to managing immediate and long-term environmental impacts of an organization's products, services and processes. Since then, ISO has continued to update the 14001 standard, with the most recent 2015 update offering substantial adjustments.

"Sustainability strategy and management best practices have rapidly transformed during the last 20 years, and we felt it was a priority for our group to overhaul GEMI's original checklist to reflect the current environment," said Mark Johnson, senior vice president, director – Environmental Compliance & Remediation Services, Gannett Fleming Inc., and communications and marketing chair, GEMI. "We moved away from GEMI's original lengthy document format to offer a spreadsheet that will make it easier for people to complete efficiently and digest the standard requirements across seven key categories."

Of note, some of the biggest changes to the ISO 14001:2015 standard—and therefore, GEMI's tool—are the following:

• Identifying and addressing the opportunities and risks that may impact an organization's environmental management system
• Emphasizing stronger requirements for identifying an organization's stakeholders and having a stakeholder communications plan
• Demonstrating commitment to improved environmental performance, not just continual improvement
• Identifying environmental aspects associated with the life-cycle stages of products and detailing where the organization can control or influence the environmental aspects of those life-cycle stages
• Requiring top management accountability and engagement to incorporate the standard in the operational functions and strategic direction of the business

"Globally, many organizations have come a long way from retroactively reporting on benchmarks to more proactive thinking on environmental management, and this tool should help all environmental professionals brush up on the latest methods," said Bill Gill, AVP environmental affairs, Smithfield Foods, and chair, GEMI.

GEMI provides a forum for its members to work together to identify and develop new solutions for current and emerging sustainability issues. GEMI's ISO 14001:2015 self-assessment checklist was developed in a collaborative process by GEMI members.  The development of this new GEMI checklist was led by Mark Johnson of Gannett Fleming with support from Steve Rowley and the Gannett Fleming compliance and management team.

GEMI's ISO 14001:2015 Self-Assessment Checklist can be found here: http://gemi.org/14001

About GEMI
GEMI (www.gemi.org) is the global leader in developing insights, networking, and creating collaborative sustainability solutions for business. For 25 years, GEMI has captured the vision and experience of global corporate environmental, health and safety (EHS) and sustainability leaders from diverse business sectors through the development of a wide range of publicly-available, solutions-based tools designed to help companies improve the environment, their operations and add business value.

More Information Contact:
Monica MacKay: 262-563-5665

SOURCE GEMI