OHSAS 18001

Certificate of conformity to OHSAS 18001:2007

OHSAS 18001, Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems—Requirements (officially BS OHSAS 18001) is an internationally applied British Standard for occupational health and safety management systems. It exists to help all kinds of organizations put in place demonstrably sound occupational health and safety performance. It is a widely recognized and popular occupational health and safety management system.^[1]

Origins

Organizations worldwide recognize the need to control and improve health and safety performance and do so with occupational health and safety management systems (OHSMS). However before 1999 there was an increase of national standards and proprietary certification schemes to choose from. This caused confusion and fragmentation in the market and undermined the credibility of individual schemes.

Development

Recognizing this deficit, an international collaboration called the Occupational Health and Safety Assessment Series (OHSAS) Project Group was formed to create a single unified approach. The Group comprised representatives from national standards bodies, academic bodies, accreditation bodies, certification bodies and occupational safety and health institutions,^[2] with the UK’s national standards body, BSI Group, providing the secretariat.^[3]

Drawing on the best of existing standards and schemes, the OHSAS Project Group published the OHSAS 18000 Series in 1999. The Series consisted of two specifications: 18001 provided requirements for an OHS management system and 18002 gave implementation guidelines. As of 2005, around 16,000 organizations in more than 80 countries were using the OHSAS 18001 specification.^[4] By 2009 more than 54,000 certificates had been issued in 116 countries to OHSAS or equivalent OHSMS standards.

Adoption as British Standard

The OHSAS 18001 specification was updated in July 2007. Among other changes, the new specification was more closely aligned with the structures of ISO 9000 and ISO 14000 so that organizations could more easily adopt OHSAS 18001 alongside existing management systems. Additionally, the "health" component of "health and safety" was given greater emphasis.^[5]

Later, the BSI Group decided to adopt OHSAS 18001 as a British standard.^[6] BSI Group subsequently adopted the updated 18002 guidance specification for publication as BS OHSAS 18002 in 2008.

How they work

Its supporters claim that an occupational health and safety management system (OHSMS) promotes a safe and healthy working environment by providing a framework that helps organizations to:

Identify and control health and safety risks
Reduce the potential for accidents
Aid legal compliance
Improve overall performance

The OHSAS 18000 standards provide organizations with the elements of an effective safety management system which can be integrated with other management systems and help organizations achieve better occupational health and safety performance and economic objectives.

BS OHSAS 18001 specifies requirements for an OH&S management system to help an organization develop and implement a policy and objectives, which take into account legal requirements and information about OH&S risks. It applies to all types and sizes of organizations and accommodates diverse geographical, cultural and social conditions.

BS OHSAS 18002 provides guidance for establishing, implementing or improving a management system which is based on OHSAS 18001 and demonstrating successful implementation of OHSAS 18001.

OHSAS 18001 can be aligned with existing ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 management systems. Historically many organizations start with the quality management system ISO 9001, then add the environment management requirements from ISO 14001. Many organizations now look at implementing all three standards at once which can minimize costs and disruption. The standards can be integrated using a standard such as BSI’s PAS 99.

Disambiguation

The OHSAS 18000 standards were written and published wholly outside of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) framework. To avoid confusion, ISO 18000 does exist – but it is a radio-frequency identification standard.^[7]

Future ISO standard

As of December 2013 the International Organization for Standardization has approved the project proposal to develop the ISO 45001 standard, an ISO analogue to the OHSAS 18000 standards. It is hoped by the ISO sub-committee organizing the standard that it will attain more international recognition and implementation than the relevant OHSAS standards have achieved.

References

External links

Official website

Occupational safety and health

diseases Journals Organizations

General
topics

Professions

Specific
disorders

Standards

Organizations

International	International Labour Organization World Health Organization

Regional/National	European Agency for Safety and Health at Work Health and Safety Executive National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health Occupational Safety and Health Administration

radiation risk
to employee

Non-ionizing radiation	Acoustic radiation force Infrared Light Microwave Radio waves Ultraviolet

Ionizing radiation	Alpha particle Background radiation Beta particle Cosmic ray Gamma ray Nuclear fission Nuclear fusion Radioactive decay Nuclear reactors Nuclear weapons Particle accelerators Radioactive materials X-ray

See also

Category
Commons

Social and environmental accountability

Ethics and principles	Aarhus Convention Corporate accountability / behaviour / social responsibility Ethical banking Ethical code Extended producer responsibility Organizational ethics Organizational justice Principles for Responsible Investment Social responsibility Stakeholder theory Sullivan principles Transparency (behavioral social) UN Global Compact

Social accounting	Double bottom line Ethical Positioning Index Higg Index Impact assessment (environmental equality social) ISO 26000 Genuine progress indicator OHSAS 18001 Performance indicator SA8000 Social return on investment Whole-life cost

Environmental accounting	Carbon accounting Eco-Management and Audit Scheme Emission inventory Environmental full-cost accounting / impact assessment / management system / profit-and-loss account ISO 14000 ISO 14031:1999 Life-cycle assessment Pollutant release and transfer register Sustainability accounting / measurement / metrics and indices / standards and certification / supply chain Toxics Release Inventory Triple bottom line

Reporting	Global Reporting Initiative GxP guidelines Sustainability reporting

Auditing	Community-based monitoring Environmental (certification) Fair trade (certification) ISO 19011

Related	Bangladesh Accord Benefit corporation Child labour Community interest company Conflict of interest Disasters Disinvestment Eco-labeling Environmental pricing reform Environmental, social and corporate governance Ethical consumerism Euthenics Health impact assessment Market governance mechanism Product certification Public participation Social enterprise Socially responsible investing Stakeholder (engagement) Supply chain management

Environment portal Category Commons Organizations

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