OREANDA-NEWS. NPO Saturn played host to the first supervisory audit of the ecological management system to show and prove its compliance with the requirements of the ISO 14001:2004 standard. A year ago, on 25 October 2012 the company was granted the DQS and IQNet certificates which acknowledge international recognition in the field of ecological management and now based on the results of the DQS audit held on 26-27 September 2013, NPO Saturn has demonstrated that it is able to honor its commitment to decreasing the negative impact on the environment.

NPO Saturn has sustained its image of an ecologically-responsible company throughout the years. The company is committed to refurbishing and upgrading its production facilities placing the emphasis on the introduction of the modern, highly efficient technologies and equipment allowing to significantly reduce the impact of the production operations on the environment. It pays particular attention to the prevention of the job-induced illnesses and protection of those working in hazardous conditions from the negative impact on their health. At the same time Saturn is creating the new types of products which harmoniously blend into the natural and social milieu.

NPO Saturn started working towards the certification of its management system in attempt to demonstrate conformity to the international ecological standards in back December 2011. It was exactly when the company's management had decided to launch a certification campaign having chosen as its certifying body the DQS Ltd. (a company based in Yaroslavl), which is the Russian branch of the German DQS-UL Group, one of the founders of the IQNet international certification network.

In order to build a formidable ecological management system, NPO Saturn set up an ecology and industrial safety certification working group with the designation of focal points on the ecological management system in 62 structural units of the company. The employees participating in the ecological management system development and implementation have been trained and qualified to administer internal ecological management audits; each of them received a name certificate. A register of legislative and legal documents was established; its function is to define the requirements to the company's operations in the field of the environment protection. The NPO Saturn ecological policy was drafted and is in effect since 01.08.2012; it highlights the main goals and commitments of the company in the field of the ecology which are an integral part of NPO Saturn's short-term and long-term strategic plans.

Tatyana Rachkova, the head of the DQS ISO 14001 audit, a representative of DQS Ltd. summarizing the results produced by the audit team noted: “You are going in the right direction. Your improvements have spoken for themselves. The NPO Saturn ecological management system has entered its active development phase; the company commits substantial resources to the upgrading of the production facilities and the introduction of the new equipment. You pay particular attention to the need of increasing the ecological performance of your products during the design and testing stages. Once again you have demonstrated the high level of competence of your employees. You have established an impeccable instruction system, which among others has an Ecological policy provision. To us, the advantages of NPO Saturn are its preventive maintenance system, test equipment measuring instruments calibration and verification system as well as your product certification systems. It is a very good result. I can resume in a nutshell that our auditors will advise the certification authorities to extend the validity of your certificate for one more year, until our next audit, as you have demonstrated full compliance with the requirements of the international ISO 14001:2004 standard.”

In conclusion of the first supervisory audit, the members of the audit committee conjointly with their Saturn colleagues carried out an ecological initiative by planting several hundreds of young pine trees thus making their own contribution to the benign environmental situation on the territory of the company.

According to Svetlana Ulyanova, DQS Ltd. development director, “the goal of the conducted supervisory audit is not the supervision but the acknowledgement of the effective functioning of the ecological management system. As you know, NPO Saturn has taken on a commitment to adhere to the requirements of the Russian environmental legislation and really raised the bar by proclaiming that it would strive to comply even with the international standards. The company has confirmed its social responsibility to the community, its partners and its personnel. I do hope that our future collaboration will be as fruitful especially since we have created another reason to come back, which is to see how the pine trees that we have planted together today are growing and come to realize again and again that the ecological situation inside the company is really something to be proud of.