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Between 150 and 200 countries have environmental laws. But it seems environmental pollution recognises boundaries because every country’s laws are different. What are the environmental policies, and why are they important? It’s a question that attracts far less attention than it deserves.
The world we inhabit today is facing a variety of environmental challenges, from climate change to habitat destruction and pollution. As we seek solutions to these problems, it becomes clear that we cannot rely solely on individual action to mitigate their impact.
Instead, we must turn to environmental policies that aim to regulate, incentivise, and encourage sustainable practices. Environmental policies are the most important tool we have to address environmental challenges and ensure a sustainable future for our planet.
We explore the environmental policies, their purpose and importance, and the challenges and limitations they face. The most important policies deal with connecting people and the natural environment. This includes Sustainable Development, Protecting Natural Resources and Ecosystems, and Slowing Climate Change
So let’s discover how environmental policies can make a difference in the world we live in.
Definition and Types of Environmental Policies
An environmental policy is defined as, A company or organisation’s declaration of commitment to the environment. As a rule, an environmental policy should unify the environmental vision of all the key stakeholders. Namely employees, management, partners, shareholders, customers, and suppliers.
It is typically one of the first action steps a company or organisation takes towards reducing its environmental footprint. And is a clear demonstration of a commitment to mitigating environmental impact. Each policy states a number of specific improvements that can be measured to prove this reduction and track performance.
There are three types of environmental policies:
- Regulatory: An environmental regulatory policy refers to regulatory compliance with a specific area’s environmental laws, guidelines and standards. They govern what an organisation can and cannot do regarding the environment. (For example, not dumping waste into local rivers or water sources.)
- Economic: An economic environmental policy orbits around how organisations can both use and manage finite resources. And in a way that aligns with a positive environmental impact. These policies are used by governments to weigh the pros and cons of allowing organisations to use toxic materials. Adding what impact that may have on the profitability of said organisations.
- Voluntary: A voluntary environmental policy is one that a company or organisation voluntarily creates and executes. Rather than one that is assigned to them by a governing body. For example, Ford, Disney, and Fisher Investments are all large organisations with voluntary green initiatives.
Often, organisations use all 3 types of environmental policies to reduce a carbon footprint.
The Importance of Environmental Policies
When it comes to the question What are the benefits of environmental policies? the answers are many.
Just some of the main benefits of well-executed environmental policies include:
- Clearly defining environment-centric roles within the workplace.
- Mitigating the waste of both materials and energy.
- Preventing incidents that may result in liability.
- Structuring organisations in a way that effectively monitors the ongoing environmental impact.
- Showcasing to consumers and stakeholders how dedicated a given organisation is to the environment.
- Improving relationships with local communities by using less toxic materials and reducing noise pollution
- Having contractual advantages, such as when using an environmental policy that is stamped with ISO 14001 certification. This helps organisations qualify for benefits like reduced carbon costs
But the importance of environmental policies and their benefits doesn’t end there. Environmental policies serve a variety of purposes. These include:
Promoting Sustainable Development
An integral part of any successful environmental policy is promoting sustainable development. This is accomplished by establishing targets for improving environmental performance in potable water consumption, resource consumption, sustainable transport, biodiversity, greenhouse gas emissions, energy consumption, and waste-to-landfill rates.
For long-term sustainable development, three key elements need to be balanced: economic growth, social inclusion (as in encouraging both organisations and consumers to partake in initiatives), and, of course, environmental protection.
Protecting Natural Resources and Ecosystems
One of the main roles of an environmental policy is to govern the connection between people and our natural environment in a way that is sustainable, actionable, and mutually beneficial.
Traditionally, this means regulating actions like pollution control, where wastewater is dumped and how frequently, and conserving habitat loss. An environmental policy determines what is of environmental importance to an organisation beyond both financial and budgetary concerns.
Contributing to Slowing Climate Change
Since 2010, there has been a continually sustained decrease of up to 85% in the costs of solar, wind energy, and batteries.
An increasing range of environmental policies and laws are to thank for this: by bolstering energy efficiency, reducing the rates of deforestation worldwide, and accelerating the usage of renewable energy, many organisations contribute to slowing climate change.
“Having the right policies, infrastructure, and technology in place to enable changes to our lifestyles and behaviour can result in a 40%-70% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. This offers significant untapped potential,”
IPCC Working Group III Co-Chair Priyadarshi Shukla
“The evidence also shows that these lifestyle changes can improve our health and wellbeing.”
The Key Components of Effective Environmental Policies
Alongside determining what environmental policies are, it’s also crucial to know the key components that make one successful.
The three non-negotiables for any effective environmental policy are as follows:
1. Clear Objectives
Without clear objectives, both the performance and general effectiveness of a policy cannot be determined. By using specific targets (like reducing greenhouse emissions by 30% in 5 years), organisations know what in their initiatives are working–and what they need to adjust to meet their set targets.
2. Stakeholder Engagement
Strong stakeholder engagement in environmental and conservation planning is vital. When it comes to environmental policies, stakeholders generally include government representatives, businesses of all sizes, scientists, landowners, organisations, and local users of natural resources.
These groups of stakeholders often have very different positions and values that may be difficult to reconcile with each other and the planned policy. For a policy to be successful, it must encourage each stakeholder group to engage in its success.
3. Monitoring and Evaluation:
Environmental monitoring and evaluation come in a variety of forms, such as.
- Air monitoring, which is the monitoring and evaluation of air pollution and its adverse effects on people and nature
- Water monitoring, which is the monitoring and evaluation of renewable freshwater resources and how they are being maintained
- Biodiversity monitoring, which is the monitoring and evaluation of the protection of natural habitats
- Waste monitoring, which is the monitoring and evaluation of the treatment and disposal of waste
- Remote monitoring, which is the monitoring and evaluation of global pollutant effects over a period of time; and
- Enterprise monitoring, which is the monitoring and evaluation of the procedures implemented by operators of organisations regarding green initiatives.
Successful Environmental Policies and Their Impact
There are many examples of successful environmental policies and their impact around the globe.
Waitrose
In the United Kingdom, the grocery store chain Waitrose unveiled a new delivery truck fleet that is 100% powered by a unique fuel source: food scraps. Fuel made from food waste has been proven to be 35-45% less expensive than diesel.
“One of our key goals in sustainable development is to eliminate unnecessary plastics from our own brand packaging by 2023 and replace it with widely recyclable or home-compostable material. Once we meet this target, Waitrose’s environmental sustainability will be at a level where we can focus on developing other parts of our partnership with a conscious effort in maintaining our shrinking footprint.”
Waitrose
The Bank of America
The Bank of America approaches global sustainability from the top-down, with their environmental policy orbiting around one idea–to provide other businesses and organisations with the funds required to turn their environmental policy ideas into reality.
All the way back in 2014, the Bank of America launched the Catalytic Finance Initiative, which, since its inception, has directed over $10 billion to sustainability investments that would otherwise have struggled to find the necessary funds. They are often high-risk, high-impact, and early-stage projects.
The Sustainable Business Network
New Zealand’s Sustainable Business Network is an organisation that enables system change in the areas of waste, climate, and nature. They provide an array of educational tools, training, live events, and case studies to encourage other businesses to partner with their green initiatives as a way to simplify the ideation of their environmental policy objectives.
With over 20 years of sustainable action logged, the Sustainable Business Network encourages investing in urban redevelopment projects, waterway restoration projects, and more. For businesses that may not have an environmental policy yet, the Sustainable Business Network is a valuable way toget one off the ground quickly and easily.
The Challenges and Limitations of Environmental Policies
Despite the good environmental policies do for ecosystems, it doesn’t mean they are without their challenges and limitations.
The most common hurdles are:
Lack of Political Will
When it comes to regulatory environmental policies, local governments must be able and willing to create and enforce regulations.
If individual organisations’ environmental policies are more progressive than the ones permitted by the local authority, organisations may have no choice but to scale back their goals in order to adhere to governing laws.
Insufficient Funding
As mentioned in regard to the success of the Bank of America’s green initiatives, many organisations–especially small-to-medium-sized ones–may have insufficient funding to reach their environmental goals. This could include opting for cheaper waste removal, not being able to afford progressive recycling numbers, or opting for affordable but environmentally-unfriendly packaging .
The Problem of Enforcement
The lack of ability and/or motivation to effectively implement environmental policies on an individual level, state level, and global level is a common limitation. It is due to a lack of enforcement mechanisms at international level. This contributes to the global community’s failure to adhere to aligned carbon emissions goals. Consequently, environmental policies vary greatly between countries.
The Potential Unintended Consequences of Environmental Policies
Although environmental policies are inarguably beneficial for the good of the world, they can also come with unintended consequences. A policy designed to accomplish a particular objective will sometimes have the opposite effect or create new problems that differ from the one it originally intended to correct.
One such example is Daylight Saving Time (DST). Although DST was implemented as one of the original green initiatives, the ramification of its implementation was that it inadvertently increased the amount of electricity used by residential homes.
Likewise, the widespread implementation of environmental policies around the world can make consumers victims of greenwashing, which is when organisations claim to be environmentally friendly but take no action towards reducing their carbon footprint.
This may lull consumers into a false sense of security regarding which organisation to support, as well as their individual impact on the environment.
Environmental policies cannot completely offset climate change. With CO2 being at its highest level in history in 2023, neither organisations nor individuals can be complacent about our current green initiatives. If there was any time to renew our engagement and dedication to global environmental policies, it’s now.
Final Thoughts
Environmental policies represent the most crucial approach we have to preserve our planet and ensure its sustainable development. By promoting sustainable practices, protecting natural resources and ecosystems, and contributing to the fight against climate change, environmental policies play a vital role in shaping the world we live in.
However, in their implementation and effectiveness, we often face challenges, such as political will and funding and the risk of unintended consequences.
To overcome these challenges, we must ensure environmental policies have clear objectives, engage all stakeholders, and undergo regular monitoring and evaluation.
As we move towards a more sustainable future, we must continue to improve the implementation and effectiveness of environmental policies for the benefit of both present and future generations. It is only through our collective effort and commitment that we can secure a better tomorrow for our planet and all its inhabitants.