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Benzene Convention, 1971 (No. 136) - Colombia (RATIFICATION: 1976)

The Committee notes the information provided in the Government’s report, according to which the National Occupational Health Plan 2003-2007 includes the specific objective of incorporating the "issue of health and safety in the workplace into the international negotiations and agreements to which the Government is a party, as well as into the adoption of international quality standards". A core element of this objective is the activity linked to the adoption of proposals to make viable those ILO Conventions ratified by the State. The Committee hopes that increased efforts will be made and extra measures introduced to give full effect, inter alia, to the provisions referred to below. Given that the Government’s report contains no new information beyond the comments already made, the Committee finds itself obliged, once again, to repeat the following:

1. Article 1(b) and Article 4, paragraph 1, of the Convention. In its previous comments, the Committee requested the Government to take appropriate measures to extend the scope of application of its national laws and regulations, in particular to amend Regulation No. 1102 of the Institute for the Supervision of Technical Regulations (ICONTEC) and resolution No. 024000 of 1979, to ensure that national laws and regulations cover all activities involving exposure of workers to benzene or products of benzene containing more than 1 per cent by volume of benzene, in conformity with Article 1 of the Convention. The Committee notes that the above-indicated legal texts remain effective without any modification and that, to the Committee’s knowledge, no further legal texts addressing the issue have been adopted. In this context, the Government further indicates that the dissemination of Convention No. 136 and the norms on occupational safety and health are the tools of which it made use to ensure workers’ protection against any detrimental effects on their health when exposed to benzene. In this regard, the Committee recalls that the Government must take appropriate measures to implement the requirements of the Convention in its national legislation. It therefore again requests the Government to take the necessary legislative measures to ensure that national laws and regulations cover all activities involving exposure of workers to benzene and products of which the content of benzene exceeds 1 per cent by volume. In addition, the Committee requests the Government to take legal action in order to determine the work processes in which the use of benzene and products of benzene is prohibited, in accordance with Article 4, paragraph 1, of the Convention.

2. Article 9, paragraph 1(b). With regard to periodic medical re-examinations, the Committee notes the Government’s indication that an occupational health programme in enterprises has been established through subprogrammes on preventive and occupational medicine, industrial hygiene and industrial safety. The final objective of the subprogramme on preventive medicine and occupational medicine is the promotion, prevention and control of workers’ health to protect them from risk factors at work, to place them in a workplace according to their physiological conditions and to maintain their working aptitude. To this effect one of the principal activities of the subprogramme is the carrying out of medical clinical examinations of workers, i.e. pre-assignment medical examinations, periodical medical examinations during employment and, when changing employment, return-to-work medical examinations, post-assignment medical examinations and medical examinations in other situations which could alter or represent a risk for the health of the workers concerned. The Committee, taking due note of the information, requests the Government to indicate whether the medical examinations to be carried out in the framework of the subprogramme on preventive and occupational medicine are obligatory and thus if the subprogramme has a binding effect which does not leave it to the discretion of the employer to carry out or to not carry out the medical examinations. If this is not the case, the Committee, reminding the Government that this provision of the Convention calls for periodic re-examination at intervals to be fixed by national laws or regulations, requests the Government to take the appropriate legislative measures in this respect. It further requests the Government to specify the periodicity of the medical examinations to be carried out according to the above subprogramme.