does the level of iso 14000 implementation matter? (an

British Journal of Economics, Finance and Management Sciences 106 March 2017, Vol. 13 (2)

© 2017 British Journals ISSN 2048-125X

Does The Level of ISO 14000 Implementation Matter? (An Evidence from a Developing

Country)

Milad Abdelnabi Salem

Visiting lecturer at Ahmed bin Mohammed Military College, Management Department Doha.

Qatar

Senior Lecturer at Sebha University, Faculty of Economic and Accounting, Libya

[email protected]

0097430612114

Abstract

The paper aims to investigate the consequences of ISO 14000’ implementation on the

competitiveness dimensions of a sample of 226 Libyan industrial corporations. The

corporations were divided into three groups according to their levels of ISO 14000’s

implementation (corporations certified by ISO 14000, corporations in process of ISO 14000

certification and corporations don’t adopt any ISO 14000 practices). One-way ANOVA was

used to test if there any differences in the competitiveness dimensions (profits, satisfaction

and image related aspects) among the corporations. The results indicated that there is no

significant differences between the corporations in process of implementation and certified

corporations or corporations do not implement the ISO 14000 practices. Additionally, there is

a difference between corporations certified by ISO 14000 and corporations do not implement

the ISO 14000 practices. However, the differences among the corporations is found to be in

the image related aspects of competitiveness. With regard to profits and satisfactions related

practices, there is no differences between the three groups. The paper empirically supported

the role of ISO 14000 certification in improving the image of the corporation.

Keywords: Industrial Corporations, ISO 14000, One-way ANOVA, Competitiveness.

Introduction

Despite some researchers believe that environmental practices have positive consequences on

the corporations in different aspects such as revenue growth and market access, access to

capital, risk management and license to operate, human capital, and brand value and

reputation (Figge, Hahn, Schaltegger, & Synnestvedt, 2002; Schaltegger & Wagner, 2006;

Thorpe & Prakash-Mani, 2003; Weber, 2008). Yet, other researchers argued that companies

may fail to obtain full competitiveness from environmental practices (Jacobs, Singhal, &

Subramanian, 2010; Levy, 1995; Link & Naveh, 2006; Sarkis & Cordeiro, 2001; Watson,

Klingenberg, Polito, & Geurts, 2004). Consequently, the relationship between environmental

practices and companies’ outcomes need further investigation.

One of the environmental practices is the adoption of an environmental management

system, which is considered as an important step for corporations aiming to be green (Buysse

& Verbeke, 2003; Darnall, Henriques, & Sadorsky, 2008; Florida & Davison, 2001; Levy,

1995; Melnyk, et al., 2003; Sroufe, Melnyk, & Vastag, 1998; Watson, et al., 2004). For

instance, Sroufe, et al. (1998) proposed that corporations deciding to adopt and implement an

environmental management system will have a unique resource positively associated with

lower cost, shorter lead times, and enhanced quality, and thus competitiveness. Nowadays,

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the majority of corporations believe that environmental management systems could provide

corporations with competitiveness’ improvements in aspects such as optimizing the

resources, corporate image, and compliance with regulations (Florida & Davison, 2001;

Gimenez, Casadesus, & Valls, 2003). Several studies have supported the positive outcomes

of environmental management systems on different aspects of organizational performance

such as competitive advantages (Florida & Davison, 2001), operational performance

(Melnyk, et al., 2003), increasing the demand and the productivity (Nishitani, 2011) and

facility profits (Darnall, et al., 2008)

Although previous studies have found positive influences of environmental management

systems on different corporation outcomes. Yet, some researchers claimed that such

relationship is not guaranteed. For instance, Watson, et al. (2004) concluded that on one

hand, the implementation of environmental management system did not give the corporation

any competitive advantages or financial benefits; on the other hand, they found that the

implementation of environmental management system did not negatively affect the financial

performance of corporations. González-Benito and González-Benito (2005) observed a

similar result. Using aspects of environmental management systems under deminsion named

environmental planning and organizational practices, González-Benito and González-Benito

failed to find any significant relationships between these practices and financial or market

performances of corporations under study. Such conclusion comes in line with the study of

Iraldo, et al. (2009) who found that the adoption of environmental management system did

not significantly improve the competitiveness of a corporations. Moreover, using a sample of

245 ISO 9000 and ISO 14001 certified Canadian firms, Roy, et al.(2013) investigated if there

any different between firms that have only ISO 9000 and firms that have both certifications in

terms of both financial and environmental performance. The results indicated that there was

only significant relationship with financial performance of firms that have only ISO 9000.

Additionally, the results indicated that there was only significant relationship with

environmental performance of firms that have both certifications. Recently, Roy, Boiral, and

Paille. (2013) concluded that there is no significant relationship between ISO 14001

certification and financial performance of the corporation. Therefore, the role of ISO 14000

in the competitivenes is still unclear; such inconsistency creates a ground of additional

studies. Additionally, there is a need to a study consider the issue in developing countries

(Etzion, 2007; Goyal, Rahman, & Kazmi, 2013) such as Libya, when the competitiveness is

weak (Ahmed, 2010; Almahdi, 2011; Aboujdiryha, 2011; Alghadafi & Latif, 2010; Ali &

Harvie, 2011; Global Competitiveness Index, 2009- 2010; Porter & Yergin, 2006), and such

weakness might be due to environmental issues (Eltaief', 2009; International Bank of

Construction and Development, 2010; Porter, 2007; The Report of the Arab Forum for

Environment and Development, 2011).

What is ISO 14000?

The International Organization for Standardization introduced ISO 14000 as a guideline that

could be applied by the environmental management system in a corporation. The ISO 14000

includes a series of standards and guideline reference documents related to environmental

management systems. ISO 14000 has been developed in way that enables the standard to be

applicable to all types and sizes of organizations and to accommodate diverse geographical,

cultural and social conditions (Biltayib, 2006; Delmas, 2001; Melnyk, et al., 2003). The

ISO14000 incorporates the environmental management systems, auditing, performance

evaluation, labeling, goods standards, and life cycle assessment (Biltayib, 2006; Melnyk, et

al., 2003).



Delmas (2001) noted that the focus of ISO14000 was not on outcomes such as pollution,

instead the standard focuses on processes and explaining the basic elements of an effective

environmental system. These elements can represent things such as creating environmental

policies, determining the objectives and targets, creating programs to achieve the determined

objectives, measuring and monitoring, and reviewing and correcting the system. These

elements help the corporation to achieve its own objectives (Melnyk, et al., 2003). They

added that aim of having ISO14000 is assisting the corporation to focus on each step of its

manufacturing processes, which in turn could lead to better environmental performance.

This paper assumes that the adoption of ISO14000 well improve the three dimensions of

competitiveness represented by profits, satisfaction and image related aspects. The paper

expected that the corporations that in an advanced stage of ISO14000 will gain the highest

level of competitiveness’ improvements. In other words, there will be difference between

corporations’ competitiveness based on their level of adoption of ISO 14000.

Instrumentation

The existence of public available data such as KLD, TRI, and other local databases have

assisted many studies in the access of the data related to corporate environmental issues and

the overall performance of the corporation (Inoue & Lee, 2010; King & Lenox, 2001;

Salama, 2005; Sarkis & Cordeiro, 2001; Turban & Greening, 1997; Wagner, 2010; Watson,

et al., 2004). However, in the absence of such databases, the self-perception of managers has

been usually used to measure the corporate performance of the corporations in terms of their

environmental and economic aspects (Christmann, 2000; López-Gamero, et al., 2009;

Sharma, 2000; Sharma & Vredenburg, 1998; Wagner, 2007). In the case of Libya, this seems

to be the only feasible approach because there is no publicly available data with regard to the

environmental related issues in Libya.

Competitiveness is represented by a sub-segment of overall business competitiveness, is

strongly influenced by environmental activities. Eleven items are used by this study to

capture the previous mentioned issues (e.g., Al Sharairi & Al Awawdeh, 2012; del Brio, et

al., 2007; Chiou, et al., 2011; Karagozoglu & Lindell, 2000; López-Gamero, et al., 2009;

Sharma, 2001; Sharma & Vredenburg, 1998; Rao & Holt, 2005; Wagner, 2003, 2005, 2007).

The respondents are asked on 7-point Likert scale about the extent to which environmental

issues were important to improve their competitiveness.

6. Data Analysis

After assuring the reliability and validity of the questionnaire in the pilot study, 490

questionnaires were sent to Libyan corporations in nine industrial sectors for the purpose of

getting 270 respondents as a representative sample of the study. At the end, 164

questionnaires were considered to be useable returned questionnaires of this study, which

represent a response rate of 33% of distributed questionnaires, and 61% of the sample of the

study.

The outliers test is conducted using SPSS (18) program to investigate the values of

Mahalanobias distance (Hair, William, Barry, & Anderson, 2010; Stevens, 1984). These

values were compared with the critical value on Chi-square at 0.001, which is 49.73. By

doing so, 4 questionnaires were subjected to be deleted because their values were higher than

the critical value. The remaining questionnaires exhibited values less than the critical value,

which gives a clear indicator that each case is not significantly separated from the rest of the

data. Using the same program, a test of non-response bias was conducted; Armstrong and



Overton (1977), Bluman (2011), Hair, et al. (2007) suggested using the P value to determine

if there are any differences between two samples. The results of independent- samples T test

show that the P value “2 tailed” is greater than 0.05 for all variables, which indicates that

there is not enough evidence to accept that there are systematic differences between the early

and late respondents.

6.1 Factor analysis

Conducting exploratory factor analysis over 11 items of competitiveness grouped into three

groups: namely profits, satisfaction and image related aspects. These groups explained total

variance of 72.671 and achieved good values of Cronbach’s alpha as shown in table 1.

Additionally, in order to check common method bias, Harman single-factor analysis was

conducted. The single-factor model resulted in more than one factor, and the first factor

explained 26.164 of the variance, which in turn indicated that common method bias was not a

serious threat in this study (Podsakoff et al. 2003).

Table (1) Factor analysis and reliability for the measurements of competitiveness

Items Profits Satisfaction Image

Product image has been improved .326 .127 .843

Sales have been increased .827 .229 .196

Market share has been increased .661 .379 .285

Higher short-term profits has been achieved .685 .383 .329

Shareholder satisfaction has been increased .431 .728 .219

Management satisfaction has been increased .259 .877 .132

Higher cost savings are achieved .658 .267 .377

Corporation has achieved better recruitment and staff retention .349 .642 .356

Higher long-term profits are achieved .723 .282 .267

Corporate image has been improved .303 .376 .709

Productivity are increased .714 .313 .241

KMO 0.921

Total variance explained 72.671

Reliability (Cronbach’s alpha) 0.907 0.829 0.721

Some tests were carried on to identify whether assumptions of normality, linearity, and

homoscedasticity are met (Bluman, 2011; Hair, et al, 2006, 2010; Pallant, 2007). Normality is

checked using two types of normality tests; histogram with normal curve, and skewness and

kurtosis. Proceeding linearity is relied on Normal Probability Plot of the regression

standardized residual, which has been suggested by several authors (Lattin, Carroll, & Green,

2003; Pallant, 2007). Homoscedasticity is conducted using scatter plot, which is suggested by

several literature (Hair, et al., 2007; Hair, et al., 2010; Pallant, 2007). All tests proved that

assumptions are met.

6.2 Testing differences between the groups (Improving the Performance of Employees)

This section discusses the difference between the competitiveness of corporations based on

their levels of adoption of ISO 14000. Three levels were examined to investigate if there any

differences among them in term of the performance. The levels were presented by certified



companies, companies under process of getting ISO 14000 and corporations don’t adopt any

ISO 14000 practices. The following section present the tests of differences.

6.2.1 The profit related aspects

A one-way between-groups analysis of variance was conducted to explore the impact of state

of ISO 14000 (certified companies, in process, don’t adopt any practices) on profit related

aspects of competitiveness. As shown in table 2, descriptive statistics provides information

about each group; mean, Std. Deviation, N….etc).

Levene’s test in table 3 tests whether the variance in scores is the same for each of the

three groups. The table shows that significance value (Sig.) is less than 0.05 (0.035). Thus,

the data have violated the assumption of homogeneity of variance. Therefore, using ANOVA

is not appropriate (Pallant, 2011).

Table (3) Test of Homogeneity of Variances

Levene Statistic df1 df2 Sig.

3.390 2 223 .035

The two tests (Welch and Brown-Forsythe) are preferable when the assumption of the

homogeneity of variance is violated (Pallant, 2011). However, table labeled Robust Tests of

Equality of Means (Table 4) shows that each of Welch and Brown-Forsythe tests has Sig.

value is greater than 0.05 (0.576 for Welch test and 0.597 for Brown-Forsythe test), which

indicates that there is no significant difference among the mean scores on profit related

aspects of competitiveness for the three groups (certified companies, in process, don’t adopt

any practices).

Table (2) descriptive of profit related aspects and level of adoption

N Mean Std. Deviation Std. Error

95% Confidence Interval for Mean

Minimum Maximum Lower Bound Upper Bound

Yes 51 4.6814 1.23398 .17279 4.3343 5.0284 2.00 6.25

in process 36 4.4167 1.08726 .18121 4.0488 4.7845 2.25 6.25

No 139 4.5576 1.35177 .11466 4.3308 4.7843 1.50 7.00

Total 226 4.5631 1.28437 .08544 4.3947 4.7314 1.50 7.00

Table (4) Robust Tests of Equality of Means

Statistica df1 df2 Sig.

Welch .555 2 87.197 .576

Brown-Forsythe .518 2 138.790 .597

a. Asymptotically F distributed.



6.2.2 Satisfaction related aspects

A one-way between-groups analysis of variance was conducted to explore the impact of the

impact of state of ISO 14000 (certified companies, in process, don’t adopt any practices) on

satisfaction related aspects of competitiveness. As shown in table 5, descriptive statistics

provides information about each group; mean, Std. Deviation, N….etc).

Levene’s test in table 6 tests whether the variance in scores is the same for each of the

three groups. The table shows that significance value (Sig.) is less than 0.05 (0.000). Thus,

the data have violated the assumption of homogeneity of variance. Therefore, using ANOVA

is not appropriate (Pallant, 2011). The two tests (Welch and Brown-Forsythe) are preferable

when the assumption of the homogeneity of variance is violated (Pallant, 2011).

However, table labeled Robust Tests of Equality of Means (table 7) shows that each of Welch

and Brown-Forsythe tests has Sig. value is greater than 0.05 (0.809 for Welch test and 0.807

for Brown-Forsythe test), which indicates that there is no significant difference among the

mean scores on satisfaction related aspects of competitiveness for the three groups (certified

companies, in process, don’t adopt any practices).

Table (7) Robust Tests of Equality of Means

Statistica df1 df2 Sig.

Welch .212 2 71.116 .809

Brown-Forsythe .215 2 88.914 .807

a. Asymptotically F distributed.

6.2.3 Image related aspects

A one-way between-groups analysis of variance was conducted to explore the impact of the

impact of state of ISO 14000 (certified companies, in process, don’t adopt any practices) on

image related aspects of competitiveness. As shown in table 8, descriptive statistics provides

information about each group; mean, Std. Deviation, N….etc).

Table (5) descriptive of satisfaction related aspects and level of adoption

N Mean Std. Deviation Std. Error

95% Confidence Interval for Mean


Yes 51 4.7255 1.39317 .19508 4.3337 5.1173 1.00 6.67

in process 36 4.5093 1.78083 .29680 3.9067 5.1118 1.33 7.00

No 139 4.6139 1.19531 .10138 4.4134 4.8144 1.33 7.00

Total 226 4.6224 1.34367 .08938 4.4463 4.7985 1.00 7.00



8.548 2 223 .000



Table (8) descriptive of image related aspects and level of adoption

Table (9) represents the Levene’s test for homogeneity of variances to tests whether the

variance in scores is the same for each of the three groups. The table shows that significance

value (Sig.) is greater than 0.05 (0.139). Therefore, the assumption of homogeneity of

variance is approved.



1.989 2 223 .139

However, the table 10 shows that the Sig. value is less than 0.05 (0.005), which indicates that

there is significant difference among the mean scores for the three groups (certified

companies, in process, don’t adopt any practices).

Table (10) ANOVA

Sum of Squares df Mean Square F Sig.

Between Groups 14.409 2 7.205 5.458 .005

Within Groups 294.361 223 1.320

Total 308.770 225

In such case, the post-hoc tests informs exactly where the differences among the groups

occur. From the table labelled Post Hoc (Table 11 of Multiple Comparison), the column

labelled Sig shows the two groups being compared are significantly different from one

another at the p<.05 level. In the results presented in the post-hoc table indicates that only

group 1 (certified companies) and group 3 (companies don’t adopt any practices) are

statistically significantly different from one another in term of their image related aspects of

competitiveness. Group 2 (companies in process of certifying by ISO 14000) does not differ

significantly from either group 1 (certified companies) or group 3 (companies don’t adopt

any practices).

N Mean

Std.

Deviation

Std.

Error

95% Confidence Interval for

Mean


yes

in process no

51 5.0441 1.08248 .15158 4.7397 5.3486 2.25 6.50

36 4.4792 1.06967 .17828 4.1172 4.8411 1.75 6.50

139 4.4317 1.19092 .10101 4.2319 4.6314 1.50 6.75

Total 226 4.5774 1.17146 .07792 4.4239 4.7310 1.50 6.75



Table (11) Post Hoc Tests (Multiple Comparisons)

Dependent Variable: Image related aspects

Tukey HSD

(I) ISO14000 (J) ISO14000

Mean

Difference (I-J) Std. Error Sig.

95% Confidence Interval

Lower Bound Upper Bound

yes in process .56495 .25010 .064 -.0251 1.1551

no .61246* .18809 .004 .1687 1.0563

in process yes -.56495 .25010 .064 -1.1551 .0251

no .04751 .21486 .973 -.4594 .5545

no yes -.61246* .18809 .004 -1.0563 -.1687

in process -.04751 .21486 .973 -.5545 .4594

*. The mean difference is significant at the 0.05 level.

4. Conclusion

The paper aims to investigate the role of ISO 14000 in improving the competitiveness of

companies. The result of paper are consistent with the results of previous studies (Roy, et al.,

2013; González-Benito & González-Benito, 2005; Watson, et al., 2004). It found that the

level of ISO 14000 implementation will not affect neither profits nor satisfaction related

aspects. However, the paper results that the image aspects of competitiveness will be affect

by the certification of ISO 14000. The data indicated that companies have to be certified by

ISO 14000 to improve their image. In addition, it revealed that there is no difference between

companies in process of ISO certification and companies don’t adopt any practices of ISO

14000.

The paper contributes to the body of knowledge by stating and testing the potential

effects of three levels of IS0 14000 certification on three dimensions of competitiveness.

Additionally, the paper empirically supports that the certification of ISO14000 will improve

the image of the company. This study represents the first study to have considered this issue

in developing countries. Finally, it may help create or improve the awareness of the decision

makers in Libyan industrial corporations towards their environmental actions, and the means

to utilise such actions in improving the image of companies.

Despite its contributions, the paper has several limitations that should be taken into

consideration. First, the study used a self-reported questionnaire filled in by managers and,

therefore, survey data might be subject to social desirability bias (Baba, 2004; Sharma, 2000).

Second, since this study was conducted in Libya which is considered a developing country,

caution should be taken when generalising the results of the study, and the results may be

generalised only to a similar environment and stage of development. Finally, although 164

industrial corporations can represent an acceptable sample size for this type of study, future

studies should increase the sample size to obtain stronger results. This based on the fact that

the sample size can affect the results of a study, and the bigger the sample size, the more

credible and generalisable the results (Hair et al., 2010).



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does the level of iso 14000 implementation matter? (an

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