IOHS-RM is planned to transfer Italian and Hungarian know-how (skills, academicals curricula, research methodologies) related to the health and safety at the workplace to Moldova. This know-how transferring is part of essential challenges in organizing of Occupational Health services that the Republic of Moldova is facing to ratify International Labour Organization (ILO) Convention Nr.161, on occupational health services.

In 2008, as part of the transposition of the EU legislation, the Republic of Moldova adopted the Law on occupational safety and health (Low No. 186 of 10.07.2008 Safety and Health at work), in which the State Inspectorate of Labour is declared the main and the national institution capable of occupational safety and health. Since 2018, following the implemented reforms, the competences of the State Labour Inspectorate and those of National Agency for Public Health (NAPH) of the Republic of Moldova have been combined and delegated to 10 national centres, whose employees need professional training in the field of occupational health.

The professional training of doctors in occupational health is carried out at Nicolae Testemitanu State University of Medicine and Pharmacy (SUMPh) and it does not cover the real needs in the respective specialization. Another problem is the lack of training of the healthcare professionals in the primary health care sector that are engaged in the medical examinations (preventative and periodic) of the employees exposed to the risk factors at the workplace. Thus, the NAPH, currently responsible for evaluating and forecasting the occupational risk factors and the side health effects, as well as drafting the policy documents on health and safety at the workplace, is deprived of evidence (records, factual data) in disputing the causal relationships and drafting policy documents.

General aims

The general aim of this project is to improve the Occupational Health and Safety  System in the Republic of Moldova.

Specific objectives

O1) to implement the most appropriate research methodologies for estimating risk factors due to occupational exposures;

O2) to review the national legislative and normative acts in order to facilitate the ratification of ILO Convention No. 161 on occupational health and safety in the Republic of Moldova;

O3) to strengthen the competencies of the academic staff in occupational health and safety;

O4) to establish a sustainable research partnership between the Republic of Moldova, Italy and Hungary, with coordination and harmonization of the modernised occupational exposure assessment methods, and the facilitation of the integrated research strategy on occupational health.