The Influence of ISO 9001 & ISO 14001 on Sustainable Supply Chain Management in the Textile Industry

Abstract

The examination of implementing ISO standards can provide new insight as to their quality and environmental management benefits. These insights can be more impactful in manufacturing sectors and especially textiles as this sector is known for its environmental degradation and questionable supply chain practices. This exploratory study investigates the extent to which organizations that implement either ISO 9001 or 14001 standards impact sustainable supply chain management (SSCM). We also investigate the extent to which these two standards improve SSCM for the textile industry within a block of European countries consisting of Poland, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic. In this empirical study, we use several measures to help identify the extent of impacts of examined standardized management systems on improvements in different processes of SSCM. Our contributions to the field include finding that quality management systems support environmental processes, relationships with stakeholders, processes within the supply chain, and SSCM. Other findings include implementing environmental management system standards impact the rationalization of other processes. Finally, we find more significant supply chain impacts with the implementation of both standards than by either standard alone. The study concludes with suggestions for extension of this study and opportunities for further research.