OHSAS 18001 Occupational Health and Safety

OHSAS 18001 is an internationally recognised standard for occupational health and safety. It was developed to enable organisations to demonstrate any evidenced occupational-health-and-safety performance.

Standards such as ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 address quality and environmental management, but there was no comparable standard for employee safety. To meet that need, the OHSAS Board was established in the United Kingdom. The OHSAS 18001 standard that emerged from its work has become a widely accepted occupational-health-and-safety standard worldwide.

Built around human-resources management and ensuring staff work under reliable conditions, the standard lets organisations focus on occupational health and safety in a planned, organised way. OHSAS is not an ISO standard like ISO 9001 or ISO 14001. It was developed by the British Standards Institution and is accepted around the world. The standard focuses on workers' health and safety conditions rather than the quality of the organisation's products or services.

Occupational health and safety. The International Labour Organization defined occupational health and safety for workers in 1950. Under this definition, every organisation is required to safeguard and protect its workers' occupational health and safety, their adaptation, and their mental health, and to take appropriate measures.

Occupational health and safety management system. The occupational health and safety management system lets organisations monitor occupational-health-and-safety conditions and improve continuously. The standard matters from moral, legal, and financial perspectives. The moral obligation is to protect worker occupational health; the legal obligation is to be protected against the financial and non-financial compensation that can arise under law. The management system reduces worker injury, illness, and medical-care costs to a minimum.

Development of OHSAS 18001. The standard was first published in 1999 and was revised in 2007; the current edition is the 2007 revision. The OHSAS 18002 guidance standard was published alongside it. By 2005 the standard had been accepted in more than 100 countries, and by that date 50,000 certificates had been issued.

How OHSAS 18001 works. The occupational health and safety management system encourages organisations to provide a healthy, safe working environment and aims to build awareness to minimise the likelihood and risk of accidents. It is compatible with and easily integrated with other management systems. It also supports operations that take applicable laws and regulations into account.

Structure of the OHSAS 18001 Standard

1. Standard scope
2. Referenced standards
3. Terms and definitions
4. Occupational Health and Safety Management System Requirements. General requirements. Occupational Health and Safety Policy. Occupational Health and Safety Planning. Hazard identification and risk assessment. Legal requirements. Objectives and other policies. Implementation and operation. Resources, roles, and responsibilities. Training. Communication and participation. Documentation. Operational control. Emergency plan. Control. Performance measurement. Conformity assessment. Nonconformity correction. Records control. Internal audit. Management review.
   1. General requirements
   2. Occupational Health and Safety Policy
   3. Occupational Health and Safety planning. Hazard identification and risk assessment. Legal requirements. Objectives and other policies.
      1. Hazard identification and risk assessment
      2. Legal requirements
      3. Objectives and other policies
   4. Implementation and operation. Resources, roles, and responsibilities. Training. Communication and participation. Documentation. Operational control. Emergency plan.
      1. Resources, roles, and responsibilities
      2. Training
      3. Communication and participation
      4. Documentation
      5. Operational control
      6. Emergency plan
   5. Control. Performance measurement. Conformity assessment. Nonconformity correction. Records control.
      1. Performance measurement
      2. Conformity assessment
      3. Nonconformity correction
      4. Records control
   6. Internal audit. Management review.
      1. Management review

Scope of OHSAS 18001 Occupational Health and Safety Consultancy

• Analysis of the organisation's current state
• Identifying the legal conditions applicable to the firm
• Training planning
• Documentation preparation
• Ensuring the system functions properly
• Certification application
• Pre-audit planning (optional)

Eurocert specialists support your organisation on occupational health and safety.