An empirical model for decision-making on ISO 14000 acceptance in the Shanghai construction industry

A remarkable disagreement/deviation between the rate of ISO 14001 registration and the rate of implementation of environmental impact assessment in the Chinese construction industry indicates that the contractors there might not have really applied environmental management (EM) in construction projects. This hypothesis has been tested in this paper by a mail questionnaire survey conducted to 72 main contractors in Shanghai, mainland China. The survey results indicate that there are five classes of factors influencing the acceptability of the ISO 14000 series of EM standards. Reasons why approximately 81% of contractors surveyed are indifferent to the ISO 14000 series are then analysed based on the critical classes. A linear discriminant model for decision-making for construction companies on whether to accept the ISO 14000 series is developed.