What sustainability standards exist in Georgia
On international markets the label sustainability standards usually refers to voluntary certifications and ESG reporting frameworks. Georgia has no such specialized standards regime — and this must be said plainly, at the outset. What does exist in Georgian law is a catalogue of binding environmental norms established by the Law of Georgia on Environmental Protection: these are the only standards that carry legal force and whose breach produces real adverse consequences. This page explains which norms exist, who establishes them, and what that means for your business.
The purpose of establishing environmental protection norms is to determine norms for the impact of activities on the environment that ensure the ecological balance of the environment. To this end the law regulates: qualitative norms of the state of the environment; permissible limit norms of emission of harmful substances into the environment and of pollution of the environment by microorganisms; norms for the use of chemical agents in the environment; ecological requirements for products; and norms of environmental load. These four pillars are what a company operating on the Georgian market should treat as its sustainability standards.
Fundamental principles — the frame for applying the norms
Environmental norms do not operate in isolation. They are complemented by the fundamental principles of environmental protection, with which state governance bodies and natural and legal persons — regardless of ownership and organizational-legal form — are obliged to comply when planning and implementing activities. These principles determine how each specific norm is read and applied to you.
The law defines the risk reduction principle, under which the subject of an activity must take appropriate measures to prevent or reduce the risk of harmful impact on the environment and human health; the sustainability principle, covering the use of the environment and natural resources where no threat is created to the development of society; and the priority principle, under which a more expensive, less risky action is given priority provided its cost does not exceed the costs of compensating the damage caused by the less expensive action. The principle of paid nature use establishes that the use of land, water, forests, flora and fauna, subsoil and subsoil natural resources is chargeable, and the polluter pays principle obliges the subject of an activity to compensate the damage caused to the environment.
In addition, the principles of maintaining biological diversity, waste minimization, recycling, restitution, environmental impact assessment, public participation in decision-making and access to information all apply. When complying with the norms, these principles together form the rule of interpretation: where doubt exists, the option less harmful to the environment must be chosen.