Tourism businesses which do not take the environment into account could face a reduction or loss of their official star rating under new requirements launched by Qualmark.

Qualmark, New Zealand's official tourism rating agency, yesterday announced plans to include environmental sustainability factors in all its rating assessments from August and those who go to extra efforts will be recognised with an additional bronze, silver or gold Enviro rating.

The rating will take into account five areas: energy, water, waste, community involvement and conservation.

Chief executive Geoff Penrose said Qualmark wanted to ensure environmental sustainability became a part of everyday best practice in an industry which is reliant on New Zealand's clean, green image to sell itself to international visitors.

"We will still keep doing what we do around assessing customer service, facilities and hygiene, but in addition environmental and social management is really important too. It's now just best business practice."

The change means that Qualmark could withdraw a licence from a business which chose to be anti-environmental.

Penrose said some parts of the assessment such as whether a business recycled would be non-negotiable, but overall it was intended to benon-prescriptive to allow businessesto formulate their own strategiesrelative to their size. To help tourism operators with ideas, Qualmark is sending out a 48-page responsible tourism guide and will also have suggestions on its website.

Penrose said many operators wanted to improve their businesses but did not know where to start.

"What we want business to do is to understand what they are doing is management practice and they don't just change the lightbulbs and that's it."

For accommodation providers who already have a one to five star rating, the new environmental factors will make up 5 per cent of their overallrating assessment.

Tourism activity, transport and service providers have been assessed on environmental factors since 2003 but the new system will broaden the number of areas where businesses are expected to be up to speed. It will have an 8 per cent weighting in an assessment where operators are either given a recommendation or not.

Those who want to go further and achieve a bronze, silver or gold rating will be expected to have a detailed plan on how they will manage the five key factors, set goals to reduce their environmental impact and monitor it regularly. Penrose said gold-rated firms would have a minimum of 25 actions on their plan.

The scheme has been benchmarked against Britain's green rating scheme to make it internationally comparable.

Penrose said that for some businesses the new ratings would recognise the hard work they were already undertaking to minimise their impact on the environment but for others he hoped it would serve as a wake-up call.

There is no limit on the number of businesses which can achieve the top rating, but Penrose warned that businesses would have to work hard to attain it.