The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) developed an international standard, ISO 14001, to specify requirements for environmental management systems. According to ISO, more than 300,000 organizations in 171 countries have certified to ISO 14001.

An environmental management system (EMS) can be developed in compliance with the ISO 14001 standard as part of an organization’s strategy to implement its environmental policy and address governmental regulations.The purpose of the ISO 14001 management system standard is to specify general requirements and guidelines that, when followed, should provide reasonable assurance that the outputs from the system will have minimal negative environmental impact and improved environmental performance. It should be noted that the ISO 14001 standard is non prescriptive; that is, it details what should be done, not necessarily how to do it.

The three primary processes of a management system include:

1. Core processes, their outputs, and the identification of significant environmental aspects and impacts
2. Key supporting processes, such as those for maintaining awareness of legal requirements, ensuring competency of employees, providing infrastructure, communicating EMS information, and monitoring and evaluating environmental performance
3. Management system supporting processes, such as document control, record control, and internal auditing

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