Touch is delighted to announce we have just obtained Eco-Lighthouse certification—which we believe is great for not just our company and customers, but also the planet.

Eco-Lighthouse is a Norwegian environmental management system that promotes sustainable practices in organisations and businesses. 

So far, about 8,000 Norwegian companies have this status, and many local municipalities are both paying Eco-Lighthouse members and act as certifying bodies. You can only say you are an Eco-Lighthouse verified organisation if you fulfil a number of Green operational criteria which are based on a high bar, based on national regulations, best practices, and industry standards.

All organisations must comply with the General Industry criteria, and there are also industry-specific ones, e.g., for construction or architecture.

The purpose of the certification is to help organisations enhance their environmental performance, reduce their costs, and generally contribute to a common Greener future. The certificate therefore covers a wide range of areas. These include your energy consumption, your work on sustainable waste management, how you approach transportation, and working with your supply chain. The programme even covers—quite correctly—your work environment, too.

First national Green business certification scheme in Europe formally recognised by the European Commission

More importantly, you can only get Eco-Lighthouse status if you can prove you consistently meet specific environmental requirements. A candidate for Eco-Lighthouse status must also demonstrate a commitment to reducing their overall environmental impact both now and going forward. 

We know all this, as we’ve just been through the rigorous evaluation process, where external auditors looked at all of the relevant processes. To become certified, organisations must fulfil a set of criteria established by Eco-Lighthouse. The certification process involves an initial assessment, identification of improvement measures, implementation of these measures. A final evaluation needs to be conducted and passed to ensure full compliance.

Eco-Lighthouse is also the first national Green business certification scheme in Europe that’s formally recognised by the European Commission as being equivalent to Europe’s EMAS (The Eco-Management and Audit Scheme) and the ISO 14001: Environmental family of standards.

EMAS and ISO 14001 are the main international eco-labelling schemes, but Norwegian Touch customers should note that, under Section 16-7 (2) of the Regulation for public procurements, using Eco-Lighthouse-certificated Touch as a supplier means you meet the same eco standards as EMAS (you can go here to verify all this). 

In other words, a contracting authority will accept suppliers certified under the Eco-Lighthouse Foundation scheme as you meet the EMAS/ISO 14001 levels—greatly simplifying your own Green compliance KPI work. And as we grow our international presence, customers outside Norway will also benefit from this co-recognition as well, of course.

A way to make not just smart but also profitable environmental choices

We are very proud of achieving this status, and the certificate is available on request at any time (and we’d love to talk to you about what we learned about sustainable management because of the project).

As many companies turn to secure more sustainable supply chains that address environmental concerns, systems like this - that really do help companies make not just smart but also profitable environmental choices - will become more and more useful. 

Touch specialises in Call Recording as a Service and has delivered leading-edge products in Norway, across the Nordics, and around the world since 2010.

Why don’t you contact Touch today to find out more?