New Zealand has strong labour and environmental regulations and AVS complies with all areas of those regulations. Firstly, covering all aspect of health and safety is the Accident Compensation Commission (ACC). As a Crown organisation, the ACC role is set out by the Government and exists to prevent injury, make sure people can get treatment for injury and help people get back to everyday life as soon as possible. Secondly, New Zealand is a world leader in environmental protection and conservation and the relevant government regulations are aligned closely to the agricultural backbone of the economy.

AVS Air Systems has always operated under a policy of industry best practice and we are continually reviewing all aspects of our business operations to improve internal performance and external customer experience. In 2013 AVS committed to further improvements and achieved ISO 9001 certification for quality and management as well as British Standard OHSAS 18001 for health and safety.

Following on from the success of the implementation of these two international standards, AVS has also become ISO 14001 certified in 2014 for environmental management. AVS is strongly committed to being the environmental leader in our industry sector.

These three International Standards ensure that:

• products and services are safe, reliable and of good quality.
• the company places staff health and welfare as a priority in the workplace.
• the company focuses on environmental aspect of all business inputs and outputs

In order to attain these international standards we have implemented many proven systems, procedures and tools that help reduce costs by minimizing waste and errors while also increasing productivity. The overall result of these efforts are increased company profitability, while keeping staff safe and improving environmental quality.

In addition to our Government regulations and International Standards, AVS also achieved many other domestic certification standards such as CPNZ Pre-Qualification, Standards NZ, BSRIA Certification and Site Safe Certification.

Summary of key AVS Air Systems Certification Policies.

Quality and Management ISO 9001
AVS Air systems is committed to achieving total customer satisfaction through constant monitoring and improvement of business processes. The company’s mission is to successfully deliver to our customers, high quality cost effective products and services on time, every time. We are certified ISO 9001:(2008) and we are committed to and focused on customer satisfaction and continuous improvement.

This QA policy embraces the following key principles:

• The satisfaction of customers, both external and internal, is the primary focus of the quality management activities.
• Staff are encouraged to participate in quality improvement activities through team work and regular communication.

Health & Safety ISO 18001
All AVS staff are conversant with the requirements of the Health & Safety in the NZ Employment Act and receive training in all areas of H&S concerning projects that the company undertakes. AVS view good Health and Safety practise as a core company value and have undertaken the BS OHSAS 18001:(2007) Health and Safety standard and achieved certification.

Environmental: ISO 14001
AVS is committed to continuous improvement, prevention and reduction of pollution and to minimising the environmental impact of its engineering activities, processes and services.

AVS will achieve this by:

• Minimising waste and the consumption of resources
• Ensuring full consideration of environmental effects in our projects
• Meeting current & future regulatory standards
• Set and monitor key environmental performance objectives
• Employee training
• Encourage internal & external environmental communication

AVS will identify the environmental aspects of our own activities in order to determine those which may have significant impacts on the environment. We are committed to improving the environmental performance of our company by closely identifying and managing these significant environmental variables in our professional activities.

Carbon Zero 

AVS are now internationally certified as “Carbon Zero”

In 2014 AVS looked at the process of “raising the bar” further on our environmental responsibility by undertaking a Carbon Zero certification. Our main objective was to continue to be an environmental leader in our industry by minimising emissions and waste from all aspects of our business activities. This Carbon Zero certification adds to a strong framework of international certifications including the environmental recycling standard ISO14001 gained several years ago.

Enviro-mark Solutions are the main certifier in New Zealand and their certification programs were developed by Landcare Research, one of New Zealand’s leading Crown Research Institutes.  Enviro-mark Solutions and AVS have worked closely to identify, measure, reduce and offset the primary sources of carbon release in our industrial development and engineering processes.

In 2015 AVS achieved the full Carbon Zero Certification and we have now developed an ongoing program to manage and minimise all ongoing energy consumption emissions created by our production processes, while still continuing to grow total business revenue into the future.