ANALYSIS: Going for green in the magazine sector.(environmental impact of the printing industry)

What does the new Environmental Assessment scheme mean for printers? Gordon Carson investigates

The princely sum of pounds 150 will barely buy lunch for two at some of London's pricier haunts, but the same funds will get BPIF-member magazine printers an assessment of their environmental performance under a newly launched scheme. So where do printers' priorities lie?

The Environmental Assessment scheme was highlighted at the PPA Magazines 2002 conference four months ago (PrintWeek, 10 May). It underwent testing at eight firms, including Garnett Dickinson, which reached the penultimate level, before its official launch this week. Understandably, the BPIF and its partner, the PPA, rolled out some big guns to stress its importance.

Sally Cartwright, Hello! publishing director and chairman of the PPA's Environmental Committee, and BBC Worldwide group production manager David Halford both gave it their full backing. Halford proclaimed it as a 'tremendously exciting' initiative, which would give publishers a tool to assess their printers' environmental credentials, adding that the support of the BPIF and PPA would give it 'credibility'.

There are other environmental schemes in place that printers will be familiar with, such as ISO 14001 or EMAS, but according to Dale Wallis, the BPIF's national health, safety and environmental adviser, these can cost thousands and may be unsuitable for some printers.

The scheme works like this: BPIF advisors will visit firms to assess their environmental impact (pounds 150 per visit for members, rising to pounds 750 for non members). The basis of the assessment is an eight-level questionnaire, predominantly requiring yes/no answers. Level one starts with the basics, such as 'Does the site have an environmental policy?', but even if companies have a policy in place they can fail to achieve the first level if they answer other questions in the negative.

At level five, printers will be asked to explain how their incumbent environmental management system operates - for example, how do they verify their waste contractors - while the eighth and final level examines the public reporting of their environmental policy, equivalent to EMAS standard.