WHMIS

WHMIS stands for Workplace Hazardous Materials Information System. It has two linked halves. The supplier side is federal: the Hazardous Products Act and the Hazardous Products Regulations set out how suppliers classify hazardous products and what must appear on supplier labels and safety data sheets. The workplace side is set by federal, provincial and territorial occupational health and safety laws, which require employers to train workers and manage the hazards.

WHMIS 2015 brought Canada into line with the Globally Harmonized System. That means the same hazard classes, pictograms and signal words that appear in the United States and Europe now appear on Canadian labels, although some details differ by jurisdiction. A product shipped across the border may carry labels that meet more than one national system.

Workers in Canada will mainly see two kinds of label. A supplier label comes on the container from the manufacturer or distributor. A workplace label is applied when a chemical is decanted or produced on site. Both rely on the same underlying information from the SDS. The SDS has 16 sections in a fixed order, as in other GHS countries.

Training is a core duty. Employers must make sure workers understand the hazards of the products they use, how to read labels and SDSs, and what to do in an emergency. Because rules differ between provinces and territories, a safety manager should check the requirements of the jurisdiction where the work takes place.

Compared with the US system, WHMIS is administered through different agencies and has its own category choices and label wording in places. Treat the SDS from the supplier as the authority for a given product.