Reducing environmental impact of furniture manufacturing

The main ways to reduce the environmental impact of manufacturing furniture include:

• product design and purchasing
• reducing raw material use
• secondary machining losses through cut-offs
• spraying and coating
• assembly, packaging and returns

For your environmental improvement plans to be effective you should seek management and staff buy-in.

Use an environmental management plan in furniture manufacturing

The most effective way of improving your environmental performance is to use a systematic approach rather than a series of one-off ideas and projects. The most comprehensive method is to set up an environmental management system (EMS).

If you don't have the resources to implement a full EMS, you can still use some of the same steps to manage your resources and environmental impact. These include:

• getting the commitment of senior management to improve environmental performance
• reviewing your existing environmental performance to establish a baseline measure improvements against
• identifying areas for improvement
• creating an action plan of what will be done, by who and when
• setting targets and objectives for improvements
• regularly reviewing performance

For more information see on how to carry out an environmental review of your business.