text: The EU treaties form the legal background for the development of specific EU legislation, related to 
  working conditions in general and OSH in particular. In 1989, the EU agreed on the**Framework**
  **Directive**, a major step regarding OSH. 340 This directive introduced a distinguished preventive approach, 
  based on a comprehensive risk assessment, as a dominant legal standard across all Member States. 
  Its legal obligations prescribe several basic principles: 
  
  • 
  
  the**responsibility of employers**for OSH, that is,*‘the employer shall take the measures*
  *necessary for the safety and health protection of workers, including prevention of occupational*
  *risks and provision of information and training’,*341 and the**obligation of workers**‘*to take care*
  *as far as possible of his own safety and health and that of other persons affected …’*;342 
  the obligation to**evaluate all risks**(risk assessment); 
  the preference of the**risk elimination at source**(combating the risk at source), a hierarchy of 
  prevention measures, replacing the dangerous by the non- or the less dangerous; 
  • 
  • 
  
  European Agency for Safety and Health at Work – EU-OSHA 
  118 