The CIS International Occupational Safety and Health Centre in Geneva, which was established in 1949 at the International Labour Office, collects, prepares, distributes and disseminates information and literature in various forms on the protection of people in the work process and related areas.  This Centre provides information services to anyone interested from around the world at its offices, through its website and through CIS centres located in various countries and institutions related to the CIS (see www.ilo.org/cis).

The following sources of information related to safety at work worldwide are available among others free of charge through this website:
-  database on institutions, including the CIS Centres
-  legislation database - LEGOSH
-  database containing international chemical safety cards
-  database containing international hazards data sheets on various occupations.
-  CISDOC database
-  ILO-CIS Bulletin
-  ILO Encyclopaedia
-  CIS Thesaurus
-  Glossary of terms related to safety at work (in 5 languages).

Information is also available on other publications on safety at work and related topics from the CIS Centre and the ILO International Labour Office.

The International CIS Centre also provides information services, by preparing sets of literature on selected topics, providing access to databases developed by CIS or in other departments of the ILO (e.g. Chemical Safety CD-ROM, Your Health and Safety at Work, Occupational Safety and Health in Agriculture, Forestry and Livestock Rearing, International and National Standards on Occupational Safety and Health, Key Indicators of the Labour Market 2001 - 2002, World Employment Report 2001) and full texts of documents described in the CISDOC database and the ILO-CIS bulletin (on microfiche or in the form of a CISDOC-TEXT database), etc.  

It is also possible to subscribe to a set of services in this Centre.  The following is provided for a single payment: the following issues of the ILO-CIS bulletin, several information searches and copies of all CIS publications.  

Information has been provided below on the most important International CIS Centre products:

ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY

An important publication of the International Labour Office, which is continuously being developed by the International CIS Centre, is the Encyclopaedia of Occupational Health and Safety.  This publication encompasses the whole range of problems related to the protection of in the work process.  It is a comprehensive coverage of issues encompassing such areas as the body, health care, occupational safety and health, personal protection, accidents and hazards at the workplace, safety management and policy, chemicals etc.  Information can be found through indexes by topic, authors and indexes of chemicals.  The text contains tables, charts, full texts of documents and a bibliographic listing of literature attached to given chapters.  The encyclopaedia has been published by the ILO in English and French

The latest, fourth edition of the ILO Encyclopaedia in English has been prepared in print version in four volumes and in electronic form on CD-ROM. More than a thousand experts in more than 60 countries participated in its preparation. It is extensively illustrated, contains an index of topics and authors, and also a list of more than 2,000 chemicals that are described.  This edition has been translated into Chinese, Russian and Spanish.  The  new edition have also been prepared and published in French in 2004.  Work is currently in progress on the preparation of the Encyclopaedia for publication in a Japanese language version. At the end of 2004 the English  version was inserted free of charge on the website of CIS/ILO.

SAFETY AND HEALTH AT WORK. ILO-CIS BULLETIN

This is a publication in French and English, published 3 times a year.  The main part of the bulletin is a section contains bibliographic references, together with abstracts of the content of publications, computer databases, training materials etc., on issues related to the protection of health and work.  This information is prepared by the International CIS Centre and the National and Collaborative Centres.  These write-ups are also included in the CISDOC/CISILO database. It was stopped in prited form in 2004, but at the end of 2005 it is again published on-line on CIS webside (for 2004, 2005, 2006 etc.).

CIS NEWSLETTER

This is the international bulletin of the network of CIS Centres, a monthly newsletter prepared in England by Sheila Pantry, a consultant on scientific information related to occupational safety.  The publication contains the latest information on interesting publications and computer databases, important domestic and international events related to occupational safety, health care, ergonomics and other related areas.  It contains information on the activities of various organisations and institutions, including the CIS Centres.  The important information that appears in every edition is a description of websites of institutions interested in the topics covered.  Information is also provided on courses, seminars, conferences and exhibitions that are organised in various countries.  It also publishes information on the activities and achievements of Polish institutions, which are prepared by the Polish CIS Centre.  

Further information on the services of the International CIS Centre can be obtained at: www.ilo.org/cis