# Organizations towards the Evaluation of Environmental Management Tools ISO 14001 and EMAS
## 1 Introduction
In January 2019, the total number of economic entities in Poland was equal to over 4 million, but only 68 organizations (356 locations) were registered in EMAS. At the same time, 3599 organizations (12,803 locations) were registered in EMAS in Europe [29]. It should be emphasized that most of them came from Germany (1193 organizations, 2130 locations), Italy (923 organizations, 5799 locations), Spain (803 organizations, 1000 locations), and Austria (252 organizations, 1172 locations) [26]. The research results given by EUROSTAT show that, in 2015, the highest number of implemented EMAS systems per million inhabitants was recorded in: Cyprus (62.5 organizations), Austria (29.9 organizations), Spain (23.5 organizations), Italy (17.3 organizations), Germany (15.2 organizations), and Denmark (10 organizations) [29]. In Poland this number was only 1.72 organizations per million inhabitants [26]. Additionally, it is disturbing that the number of Polish organizations which are cancelled, suspended, or resigned from EMAS has been growing since 2016 [30]. A similar phenomenon is observed in other European countries, where in recent years a growing number of organizations did not renew their certifications. For example, in Germany, 1402 organizations were registered in 2011, and 1193 in 2018, which means a decrease of 15%. Similarly, in Italy, 1035 organizations were registered in EMAS in 2011, but in 2018 this number was equal to 923 organizations [31]. [PERSON] and [PERSON], in an article published in 2018 [31], have ascertained that mostly small-sized organizations have the predisposition to renew their EMAS registrations in Italy. Additionally, they have found the negative link between the possession of standard ISO 14001 and the EMAS renewal intentions. [PERSON] et al., in a paper published in 2018 [32], have pointed out that the implementation costs may be basic reasons for not renewing EMAS, both in the case of administrations and private-owned organizations in Italy. [PERSON] et al. have reported, in the article published in 2016, that reasons for organizations' decisions to withdraw from EMAS are,inter alia, difficulties regarding system implementation and the lack of both human and financial resources [33]. The above situation prompts us to conduct further research on the factors influencing this state, starting from the motives and difficulties of EMAS implementations and ending with their benefits. The expanding and updating research in a changing situation is justified as it can be used to establish effective support tools for the organizations to encourage EMAS registration and thus maximize the assumptions of sustainability. The article deals with the issue of the implementation and functioning of EMSs in organizations based on survey research. The survey questions were directed to the organizations that have implemented EMAS (and previously had implemented ISO 14001) and to the organizations that have only implemented ISO 14001. The main purpose of this article is to analyze and compare benefits and barriers to the implementation of ISO 14001 and EMAS by organizations. The paper attempts to answer the research questions: 1. Does the implementation of either ISO 14001 or EMAS bring the same benefits and barriers to organizations, even if ISO 14001 was previously implemented? 2. Does the system functioning duration in the company influence internal and external benefits resulting from EMS implementation? 3. Are economic aspects of EMS adoption as important for entrepreneurs as the ecological aspects? As mentioned above, this issue is important due to large and still deepening disproportions between the quantities of organizations registered in ISO 14001 and EMAS in Poland in recent years. The additional problem is an increasing number of companies which decide to withdraw from EMAS registration.