The finished ISO 45001 international standard for occupational safety and health management systems will be published in March, it has been announced.
National standards bodies (NSBs) voted on the final draft international standard (FDIS) in a ballot that ended on 25 January. It was approved by 93% of them, well above the 75% required for adoption.
The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) is currently considering comments for correction from several of the NSBs.
News of the publication date follows a long and complex development process.
The first draft was published in July 2014, however it received only 42 votes of approval during a May 2016 ballot and was redrafted.
The revised, second draft was approved by 88% of NSBs during a consultation process mid-last year. The ISO/PC 283 project committee developing the standard met in September in Malacca City, Malaysia, to review the 1,600 comments made after this second round of voting.
Technical changes were then made to the second draft before the FDIS was drawn up and subjected to a yes/no ballot from November 2017 to January 2018.
IOSH’s head of policy and public affairs Richard Jones said: “It was great news at the weekend that ISO 45001 gained approved with an overwhelming 93% voting in favour of publication. IOSH understands from the ISO Secretariat that it could now be published as early as 8 March.
“We were also pleased to receive sincere thanks over the weekend from both the chair and secretary of the ISO/PC 283 committee for the part that IOSH has played in this achievement.
“We’d like to thank IOSH members for their invaluable contributions to the various consultations over the 4.5 years of development, which has been very much appreciated.”
ISO 45001 will replace OHSAS 18001, which will be withdrawn after its publication. Organisations that are certified to OHSAS 18001 will have three years to migrate to the new standard, according to the UK standards body BSI Group.
David Smith, chair of ISO/PC 283, said the alignment of ISO 45001 to the suite of ISO management system standards would be a welcome addition.
“We now have an international standard for occupational health and safety, aligned with other business standards such as ISO 9001, ISO 14001 and ISO/IEC 27001, that helps organisations manage this key risk as part of their business processes,” he said.
“ISO 45001 is a significant improvement on OHSAS 18001, which has established that standardisation using the risk-based approach works across the world and business sectors. Effective application of ISO 45001 will reduce the risk of harm in the workplace.”
Source: IOSH Magazine