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CHAPTER 1: WHAT IS OHSAS 18001?
OHSAS (Occupational Health and Safety Assessment Series) 18000 is an international occupational health and safety management system specification. OHSAS comprises of two parts, 18001 and 18002, and embraces a number of other publications. It is intended to help an organisation to control and manage its occupational health and safety risks.
OHSAS 18001 was jointly developed by a number of world-leading national standards bodies, certification bodies and specialist organisations, in response to a widespread demand for a recognised assessment and certification standard.
Like most other management system standards, OHSAS 18001 is designed on the principle of the Plan-Do-Check-Improve (PDCI) cycle. Planning for hazard identification, risk assessment and determination of controls, is a core requirement of an OH&S system. The standard makes it clear that the requirements of occupational health and safety apply to all activities, and all personnel who work for, or on behalf of, the organisation.
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CHAPTER 2: OH&S MANAGEMENT SYSTEM GENERAL REQUIREMENTS (CLAUSE 4.1)
Clause 4.1 of OHSAS 18001 follows an approach which is consistent with most other management system standards, such as ISO9001 and ISO14001. It begins by making a comprehensive statement for establishing, documenting, implementing, maintaining and continually improving a management system, based on all the requirements stated in Clause 4 of OHSAS 18001.
These requirements are mandatory for any organisation that wants to control its OH&S risks and improve its OH&S performance. The standard follows the classic PDCI approach (establish, document, implement, maintain and improve), and unlike many other standards, it has no clauses on which an organisation may seek an exemption.
An organisation could be any company, corporation or enterprise, regardless of its size, which has its own functions and administration.
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CHAPTER 3: OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY POLICY (CLAUSE 4.2)
The OH&S policy is a statement that describes the overall intention, vision and direction of an organisation, relating to its OH&S performance. It is formally expressed by the organisation’s top management, to reflect its commitment to protect health and safety of all personnel, to comply with all applicable laws, and to continually improve the OH&S performance of the organisation.
Summary of requirements
Establish an OH&S policy that includes:
1 Top management’s commitment to prevention of injury and ill health, as well as continual improvement of its OH&S performance.
2 Commitment to comply with all regulatory and other applicable OH&S requirements.
3 A basis for setting OH&S objectives.
The OH&S policy must be approved, documented, periodically reviewed, and made available to all interested parties. (The intention here is to ensure that individuals are aware of their OH&S obligations.)
How can these requirements be met by an organisation?
Putting together an OH&S policy is essentially the responsibility of top management, who must take the following steps in order to meet the requirements of this clause of the standard:
1 Identify the nature and scale of hazards and risks that are associated with the organisation’s occupational activities.
2 Define, document and approve an occupational health and safety policy that reflects top management’s vision and commitment for prevention of injury and ill health. Within the OH&S policy, top management must also state their commitment to comply with all applicable regulatory OH&S requirements, as well as a commitment to continually improve the organisation’s OH&S performance. This could be done by describing the parameters, or the direction along which the continual improvement of OH&S performance is visualised. These directions can also become the basis for setting, and reviewing, an organisation’s OH&S objectives.
3 Communicate the OH&S policy (after approval by top management) to all individuals within the organisation, along with their OH&S roles and responsibilities. An organisation could choose many methods to communicate its OH&S policy. These could include training sessions on policies and procedures, video messages, posters displayed at prominent locations, ongoing briefings, newsletters, e-mails, etc. The organisation must ensure that the language used for communicating its OH&S policy and procedures is easily understandable by all personnel.
4 Having defined and communicated its OH&S policy, the organisation must periodically review the policy for suitability and effectiveness. ‘Management review’ is one such platform which is normally used for review of OH&S policy. The frequency of review is a decision that must be made by an organisation itself.
An example occupational health and safety policy of Safe & Sound Inc. (SSI)
SSI believes in caring for the health and safety of all its employees, as well as other personnel who work for, or on behalf of, SSI. We commit to proactively work towards:
- Assessing the occupational health and safety risks, and to take steps to prevent injury and ill health to all personnel.
- Ensuring compliance to all applicable occupational health and safety regulatory requirements, as well as any other requirement to which SSI subscribes.
- Continually improving our OH&S management system, by setting and achieving higher performance goals. This shall include the reduction of OH&S incidents, providing a healthy work environment and moving towards becoming a zero injury organisation.
Chief Executive
Safe & Sound Inc.
Dated: 1April 2012 ver. 1
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CHAPTER 4: HAZARD IDENTIFICATION, RISK ASSESSMENT AND DETERMINATION OF CONTROLS (CLAUSE 4.3.1)
Summary of requirements
Clause 4.3.1 of OHSAS 18001 requires the proactive assessment of hazards, risks and controls. This requirement is, therefore, central to the establishment of a sound OH&S system.
- An organisation is required to establish, and implement, procedures for ongoing hazard identification, risk assessment and determination of controls.
- Hazard identification must include infrastructure, equipment, human behaviours, capabilities, and routine and non-routine activities of all personnel.
- The risk assessment must consider applicable legal obligations and determine the risks that may be considered unacceptable to the organisation.
- The organisation must also determine controls to eliminate, substitute, or reduce the risks that have been assessed as intolerable.
- The identified OH&S hazards, risks and controls must be recorded, and taken into account while establishing an OH&S management system.
How can these requirements be met by an organisation?
1 Begin by establishing a cross-functional OH&S hazard identification and risk assessment team. The team members must be familiar with occupational health and safety issues, organisational processes, hazardous materials and conditions, applicable OH&S laws, human behaviour, human factors, types of OH&S hazards, risk assessment techniques and hierarchy of controls.
2 Document a procedure that defines the complete initial and ongoing process for identification of hazards, assessment of risks and determination of controls. A sample procedure can be found in Appendix A.
3 Make an inventory of all locations of the organisation, in such a manner that no department or area is missed out.
4 The cross-functional team visits each location and identifies both existing and potential hazards relating to a situation, source, activity or event that could potentially cause injury or ill health.
Hazardous situations are those conditions that are typical to a location and may cause injury or ill health. These could be slippery or uneven walking surfaces, slopes, cramped working conditions, sharp bends, blind corners, badly ventilated areas, high altitudes, extreme temperatures, high traffic zones, noisy
locations, poorly lit areas or confined spaces.
Hazardous sources may be any equipment, or substances, that can cause injury or ill health. Some examples are production machines, generators, boilers, sources of fumes, corrosive and toxic chemicals, dangerous gases and liquids, flammable and explosive materials, high-pressure vessels, radioactive substances, particulates, poisons, bacteria and viruses.
The activity (routine or non-routine) -related OH&S hazards are those hazards that are faced by a person while performing a specific task. An operator working on a machine, welding a piece of metal, climbing on a height, lifting weight, handling or transferring materials, mix...
