World-class work – giving health and safety a global stage

A quick quiz question for you – how are this year’s winners of the world’s oldest football competition linked to Expo 2025, currently running in Osaka-Kansai, Japan?

Answer – current FA Cup holders Crystal Palace FC take their name from the legendary iron and glass structure, which was originally built in Hyde Park, London to house the Great Exhibition of 1851, the first-ever world exposition. It was later moved south of the Thames before being destroyed by fire in 1936.

The World Expo in Japan is just the latest global event that, every five years, “brings together people and innovations from around the world in an effort to address issues facing humankind on a global scale”.

Here’s another question – when were safety, health and wellbeing themes first illuminated at a World Expo?

Answer - they never have been, but the overarching theme of this year’s Expo is “Designing future society for our lives” and, next month, OSH will take centre stage in Osaki-Kansai. IOSH is leading the group of partners staging a two-day World Assembly for OSH, HR and related communities. Its theme is “The role of occupational safety, health and wellbeing in designing future society for our lives.”

We will run a number of sessions as part of a four-day programme (16-19 July 2025) organised by the Global Initiative on Safety Health and Wellbeing (GISHW), at Expo 25 and beyond. This will feature a day packed with eight workshops on 16 July and IOSH will be leading on half of them. This starts with Workshop 1: The future of OSH within the sustainability agenda. Here’s what that opening workshop will be all about…

World Assembly – ‘Days on safety, health and wellbeing’

Workshop 1: The future of OSH within the sustainability agenda
INTEX, Osaka

We know health and safety in the workplace saves lives. We know it can help make people’s lives more fulfilling. We also know it can play a key part in improving productivity, helping to secure business success to create and safeguard jobs.

But can it save the world? Even the most ardent OSH professionals – and there are plenty of them – will probably stop short of claiming this for their vocation. Yet, by collaborating with governments, business, civil society and individuals, the United Nations (UN) and a committed following of 191 countries around the world increasingly believe they can achieve exactly that.

The UN’s 17 interconnected Strategic Development Goals, or SDGs, also known as The Global Goals, were adopted by UN Member States in 2015 as part of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. They were established to encourage a balanced, collaborative approach that integrates economic growth, social wellbeing and environmental protection. These SDGs have become a powerful tool for creating a better life for all.

Workshop 1 under the World Assembly programme, presented by IOSH in partnership with ENSHPO, the European Network of Safety and Health Professional Organizations, will examine how much OSH, by being brought into the sustainability agenda, will have helped the world achieve by 2030. This will feature unprecedented innovation in safe and green technologies, where AI and ethical leadership have been made to work hand-in-hand to bring about large-scale decarbonisation.

Paradox

The workshop will also demonstrate how a major paradox will have had to be tackled head on: the way the rush towards sustainability will, ironically, have sometimes by-passed labour rights, particularly in the gig economy. This will throw a light on the need for a more inclusive approach, where the world needs to square rapid technological advancement with equitable working practices.

The workshop will test what sustainable development really means for workers – wherever they are in the world – and place it under heavy scrutiny. This will include close assessment of how sustainability, and its impact, should be measured.

Speakers include:

• Stuart Hughes, Immediate Past President of IOSH, co-moderator
• Francesco Santi, President of ENSHPO, co-moderator
• IOSH CEO Vanessa Harwood-Whitcher on realising the potential for OSH to deliver socially sustainable workplaces
• Kathy Seabrook CFIOSH, CEO and Founder of Global Solutions Inc, a leading OSH and sustainability consultant
• Dagmara Karbowska, Programme Manager at Lloyds Register Foundation
• Becky Hickman, RoSPA
• Michelle Garner-Janna from National Safety Council (NSC), America’s leading non-profit safety advocate
• Andresa Hernandes, Vice-President for Safety at Siemens AG
• Katerina Marozava from Associazione Italiana Ambiente e Sicurezza (AIAS).

IOSH President Kelly Nicoll will be Rapporteur for this session.

Roadmap

With the global energy channelled by this curtain-raising workshop, a formal roadmap for capturing the fundamental contribution OSH makes to sustainable development will begin to take shape.

We’ll be sharing more about the workshops we’re organising and participating in at Expo 2025 over the next few weeks.