Development of guidelines for an occupational health and safety management systems towards industry 4.0

Abstract

Despite being a topic addressed by several researchers, it continues to be the subject of investigation because nothing relevant has been concluded yet. The main goal of the current study is to develop guidelines in order to define the requirements and externalities of Industry 4.0 (I4.0) from the Occupational Health and Safety Management System (OHSMS) perspective. A literature review was carried out to understand the main concepts applied and semi-structured interviews were applied to five active Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) technicians. It was concluded that companies aren’t prepared to face the challenges posed by I4.0 through an OHSMS and ISO 45001:2018 doesn’t contemplate the new industrial revolution yet. The main difficulties highlighted by the companies were the extensive legislation that doesn’t follow the industrial developments, the high capital required for the initial investment, the difficult access to know-how and the impact that this will have on production.