During its meeting on June 22, 2004, the Board of Directors approved amendments that will result in the consolidation of all occupational health and safety regulatory requirements pertaining to the agriculture industry into the Occupational Health and Safety Regulation ("OHSR").

The amendments came into effect January 1, 2005, and significantly improve the level of health and safety protection afforded to workers in the agriculture industry.

The consolidation will provide workers with increased protection from a wide range of work-related hazards, many of which were not addressed in the former Regulations for Agricultural Operations. (e.g., vibration, repetitive strain, mechanical lockout, and heat and cold stress hazards).

Amendments were been approved to the OHSR in order to maintain relevant agriculture-specific requirements from the current Regulations for Agriculture Operations. To address issues of practicality, a number of modifications or exceptions have been provided for the industry with respect to the application of existing core requirements and general hazard requirements within the OHSR.

An implementation strategy has been developed by the Program Design Division to further assist workplace parties in achieving compliance.