| Hazardous Materials (HM) are used in petrochemical and chemical industry, but also in other areas such as transportation, agriculture or food. Given the nature of HM and their daily use, the legal framework to ensure legal protection of workers, consumers and the environment is essential. This legal protection is performed by the obligation to develop means of prevention and protection accessible to people in contact with the HM.;This information may be disclosed by a hazard system of communication which includes a hazard classification, labeling and datasheets containing information on risks and dangers associated with an activity. In this context, Canada and a number of countries have developed laws and regulations whose purpose is to provide the necessary information to the user in contact with the HD thanks to these communication hazard systems.;Currently, these hazard communication systems differ according to the types of activities (production, transmission, distribution, storage), and they differ from one country to another. In particular, they diverge on the notion of risk. Since values, tolerances accepted, means of measurement used legitimize the quantification of risk associated with HD and therefore it results in a classification of different for hazards and risks. For example, toxicity that measures the negative impact of a product on the health of humans may vary, a substance having an oral toxicity LD50 = 257mg/kg (this dose may kill 50% of a population rat) may be classified by country: Harmful, Toxic, Non Hazardous.;Beside, these hazard communication systems are non-tariff barriers which are harmful for international trade.;Among these means of prevention, information of the user of the risks involved and how he should respond to incidents when he engaged in an activity related to the HM. It allows him to reduce the probability of occurrence and impact of an accident.;Thus, the globally harmonized system (GHS) tries to bring a solution to this economic an social problem. The first version was published in 2003, and now the third version is largely applied. In particular, the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesbourg promotes GHS to be set up before 2008.;In Canada, GHS is implemented only in the transport sector, the only one depend on international regulation following the precepts of GHS. While other sectors affected by the use of hazard materials are manage by governmental regulations. Hazard communication systems are different according to the type of activity such as transport, health, environment or the institutional structure: federal, provincial and territorial governments. Complete harmonization of labeling and datasheet seems impossible in all sectors in the short term. Nevertheless, some regulations would be modified soon. WHMIS, the current hazard communication system linked to the use of HD in enterprises should eventually evolve to incorporate the GHS and other areas such as pesticides and cosmetics might be modified afterwards. Thus, part of the industry most affected by all these changes should be the chemical manufacturer subsectors.;Then, we chose to study the impact on the subsector Quebecois. This subsector is compound of 27% of establishments in Canada, and contributes to the economy of Quebec. We note a strong dependence on resources from the U.S., a great deal of regulation about HM and different hazardous communication systems, so the GHS would be profitable for the Quebec industry.;First, a literature review has showed why the government has to intervene for monitoring hazardous material using and particularly by divulgating information with labels and datasheets. Second, it has explained benefits cost analysis and how it helps to determine regulatory impact. Finally, the third part of this review is an analysis of different studies done by countries to put in SGH. Thus, three majors long-term benefits are highlighted: reducing administrative costs, reducing health and security costs and so costs linked with training, and deleting non barrier tariffs. Contrary to the costs which depend on setting up GHS in establishment and therefore they are mainly short term cost like teaching or managing costs.;Thanks to context and literature review, we have built a model to explain different relation between characteristics of the companies and their wish to integer GHS. These companies belong to the chemical manufacturing subsector.;Survey by using a questionnaire collect data whose we needed to check and validate our model. In this case, statistical tool used to analyze responses and find some trends. Because our research is exploratory one, we did more than simple descriptive analysis but also cross analysis in order to understand some trends and define new research problems.;The analytical part shows a willingness to accelerate the implementation of GHS thanks to its advantages are the elimination of nontariff barriers, the administrative simplification and the improved understanding of the users. However, concerning health and safety, GHS is not perceived as an improvement of existing communication systems. Since few respondents believe that there will be a decrease in occupational incidents and occupational accidents due to HD. Also, the responding firms noted that the standardization of communication systems do not reduce the costs associated with HD. In particular, it appears that the costs associated with training, management and classification are paramount. And the impact in terms of costs is positively correlated with firm size, the percentage of activities related to HD and the number of regulations applied. |
