As an audit team member, you are auditing XM, an organisation that processes animal leather...

As an audit team member, you are auditing XM, an organisation that processes animal leather products. This is a second-party audit from a potential XM customer.

At the Environmental Manager ' s (EM) office, the dialogue is as follows:

You: Could you please tell me what action XM has implemented to address the requirement of improving environmental performance?

EM: Yes, we had two significant impacts: odour (affecting the population nearby) and pollutants (contaminating the river). In the last management review, we decided to tackle these issues. We introduced cold storage techniques to prevent odour emission and lower the pollutant load in our wastewater stream. We were quite successful in reducing the impact; we are particularly happy to see the level of contaminants in the water discharge quite low now. Before, we were very close to the maximum value accepted by the law. We improved our environmental performance considerably. Do you want to see the data?

You: No thanks, it ' s OK. I noticed that you had an increase in energy consumption. This is a deterioration of XM ' s environmental performance.

EM: Yes, that ' s correct; this is due to the cold storage facilities we had to install, an unintended consequence that we are monitoring on a regular basis to ensure that it does not exceed planned levels.

How would you respond? Select one.