The European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (EU-OSHA) has officially opened its new offices in the centre of Bilbao. Roxana Mînzatu, Executive Vice-President of the European Commission, performed the opening and discussed key occupational safety and health topics with agency staff and management during her visit.
Three urgent challenges took centre stage during the visit: the impact of artificial intelligence on the workplace, the growing issue of heat at work, and psychosocial risks. Mînzatu emphasised the importance of innovation in creating safer and healthier working conditions.
The relocation to modern and centrally located office premises has a clear strategic objective. The new location is intended to strengthen collaboration with local and European partners whilst providing a higher quality working environment for the agency’s own staff. In addition, the relocation contributes to reducing the organisation’s ecological footprint.
For HSE professionals, EU-OSHA’s renewed focus on current topics is relevant. The explicit attention to AI-related risks reflects the growing digitalisation of work processes and the associated safety and health challenges. Climate-related risks such as heat stress are also receiving explicit attention, an issue that is becoming increasingly urgent in numerous sectors due to rising temperatures.
The focus on psychosocial risks aligns with the broader recognition that mental health and work-related stress fall under working conditions just as much as physical safety. This integrated approach requires HSE professionals to develop an increasingly broad competence profile.
The visit underlined once again that good working conditions and successful business go hand in hand – a message of strategic importance for safety professionals when positioning HSE policy within organisations. EU-OSHA’s new premises symbolise the ambition to play an even more active role as a knowledge centre in European collaboration on occupational safety.
Source: EU-OSHA, 27/08/2026, https://osha.europa.eu/en/highlights/building-partnerships-safer-work-eu-osha-moves-its-new-premises