This article is based on a presentation that I made at Moray House last Thursday evening. It seeks to provide answers to two of the following five questions that I had posed.
What is environmental auditing?
Why is it so important in today’s environment?
How is environmental auditing different from other forms of auditing?
Who is responsible for conducting environmental auditing? and
What are the techniques used in conducting environmental auditing?
Environmental auditing in perspective
In a previous article, we defined an environmental audit as an independent review or evaluation to assess the extent to which an organisation is conducting its operations with due regard to the need to safeguard the environment against degradation, and in compliance with applicable laws, standards, regulations, rules and policy guidelines. Where deficiencies or gaps are identified, they are reported along with an assessment of their impact, and recommendations made for corrective action. Environmental auditing is not dissimilar to financial auditing, except that the focus is on the environment instead of the financial statements.