The closing date for the pan-European photography competition organised by the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (EU-OSHA) is fast approaching. Based on safe and healthy workplaces, final entries can still be submitted up until 15th August 2009. The competition has so far attracted significant interest from citizens across the European Union with over 500 entries to date.

The competition - entitled What’s your image of safety and health at work? - is an essential part of EU-OSHA’s Healthy Workplaces campaign to promote awareness of occupational safety and health throughout all Member States. This scheme encourages European citizens to express themselves creatively and provide their own interpretations of safety and health in the workplace.

Healthy Workplaces is the largest information campaign on occupational safety and health, running in all EU Member States and beyond to promote efficient risk management. Under the slogan “Healthy Workplaces Campaign. Good for you. Good for business”, more than 40 European multinationals, employers’ federations, NGOs and employees’ organisations help EU-OSHA to spread the message among workplaces and improve European workers’ conditions.

Creativity is one of the pillars of this campaign, which will reward the best documentary on word-related topics.

Participants can submit their entries on any work-related topic, with particular emphasis on expressing the positive values and impact of safe and healthy workplaces. The winners stand to receive prizes that total € 7,000. The campaign has its own dedicated website where citizens can register and submit their entries.

One of the prizes will be decided by an on-line vote so that the public has the opportunity to decide on their favourite photograph from the entrants. The prize will be € 1,000 and voting will begin from the 16th August for a period of 4 weeks on the competition website. The remaining three prizes will be decided by a jury composed of some of Europe’s foremost photographers.

The European Agency for Safety and Health at Work was set up by the European Union to help meet the information needs in the field of occupational safety and health. Based in Bilbao, Spain, the Agency aims to improve the lives of people at work by stimulating the flow of technical, scientific and economic information between all those involved in occupational safety and health issues.