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• Audits and certification

Audits and certification

EHS audits
We carry out Environment, Health and Safety (EHS) audits to assess implementation of our EHS management system and standards. The audits also assess sites’ compliance with key legislation. They are carried out by internal auditors who are certified as lead auditors against the international environmental management standard ISO 14001.

We aim to conduct EHS audits at each operational site at least once every four years. We carry out more frequent visits at selected sites, depending on an assessment of risk and the issues raised by previous audits.

In 2004, 33 sites were audited including three key office locations. Two thirds of sites achieved acceptable scores (which we define as over 70%). The average score across all sites audited was 71%. Ten sites in Belgium, Germany, Ireland, Japan, Turkey, UK and the US achieved high scores of over 80%. One site in the UK achieved a leadership score of over 90%. See more on audit achievement.

The highest scores were on environmental issues. We identified a number of health and safety issues which require attention. See how we manage health and safety for details of the issues identified.

All sites are required to develop plans to address any weaknesses and opportunities to improve identified in the audit. Auditors monitor sites’ progress in implementing the plans. In 2004 the EHS audit process and scoring system were further refined based on experience and feedback. We are testing EHS auditing software on our intranet site to help the auditors track progress, and aim to have a fully functional version ready in 2005.

EHS certification
In 2004, four sites achieved dual certification to the international environmental management standard ISO 14001 and the international health and safety standard OHSAS 18001 for the first time. One site did not renew its certification in 2004 and one site certified only the utilities area. This means that 21 out of 84 pharmaceutical and consumer manufacturing sites are now certified (14 sites are certified to both ISO 14001 and OHSAS 18001, and seven sites are certified to ISO 14001 only) and one site’s utility area is certified to both. The certified sites are in China, Egypt, France, Germany, India, Italy, Mexico, Poland, Spain, Turkey and the UK.

We are working to increase site certification and expect to have around a third certified by the end of 2005. We will then be in a position to move towards global certification.

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