The Institute of Health & Safety held another successful half day seminar entitled “Environmental Management – Balancing Profits with the Environment” at the Le Meridien St Julian’s. It was well received by the sizeable audience hailing from various industries, organisations as well as NGOs and government departments.

The main speaker was Paul Kneller, a senior lecturer in Environmental Science from the School of Conservation Science of Bournemouth University. He has been using Malta as a case study for his students for the past 10 years and is very familiar with the local scene, having observed first hand the massive advances as well as the pitfalls and challenges we face as a country in this regard. This experience makes him uniquely suited for this topic.

In fact his presentation was divided into five sections,

a) starting off with the global situation,

b) moving onto the status within the Mediterranean,

c) considering the aspects of Environmental Management from a national perspective,

d) before focusing on organisations

e) and finally how each individual impacts and can contribute to our environment.

The feedback from the audience was extremely encouraging. In fact, Mr Kneller may well consider working in conjunction with private companies on how to achieve this delicate balance between being profitable and minimising the impact their operations have on the environment. “It is not only the marketing potential that exists when effecting these projects, but also the satisfaction of being a good corporate citizen what makes these efforts worth while for commercial entities” he said.

This was another event in a series of information seminars organised by the Institute of Health & Safety for the business community to increase awareness and improve standards on a national level where occupational health, safety and the environment are concerned.