Factors Influencing the Implementation of Environmental Management Systems in Ghanaian Firms

Abstract

This paper investigates the driving forces of environmental management systems implementation in Ghana. Structured questionnaire was used to target environmental, health, safety, operations, administrative officers and managers. In all, fifty three respondents were surveyed and the results show that the top issues driving the implementation of environmental management systems in Ghana in order of importance based on their mean values on a five- point Likert scale were: operational benefits (4.44), marketing opportunities (4.23), public relation/image (4.18), conservation of natural resources (4.17), potential cost savings (4.16) and competition (4.13). Pressure from employees and customers seems to have little or no influence as far as the implementation of environmental management system is concern recording a mean value of 3.02. This indicates the need for organizations that have implemented environmental management systems in their operations to catalogue the operational benefits and the other opportunities gained in order to attract other firms to implement this system. It is also essential for intensive internal awareness programmes for employees to be well informed on the benefits of environmental management systems in order to be motivated during its planning and implementation. The study considered only ten key factors that drive environmental management system implementation. Future studies can also look at the support of top management as well as the challenges they face in implementing environmental management systems.