Safety first, improving workplace conditions

In order to improve the safety and health conditions at the workplace, the organisation has set up several strategies centred on improving the agency’s operational systems they include efforts to: Extend their services closer to the people, increase workforce, improve their customer care, increase speed and standard of services.

The challenge
The low level of awareness on occupation health and safety issues amongst business owners, workers and the general public is one of the major challenges constraining the authority in its efforts to improve the situation.

Owing to that, the authority is now investing much of its resources to address this challenge. Among other efforts, a campaign to register more businesses with OSHA as well as increasing public awareness on its role and associated benefits has been formed.

The campaign has been launched in the Lake Zone and in some areas of the central zone. According to the Chief Executive Officer, Occupation Safety and Health Authority Akwilina Kayumba the construction industry is one of the most affected despite its importance to the economy of many countries.

Owing to its relative labour intensive nature, construction workers provide opportunities for employment for wide range of people skilled, semi skilled and unskilled.

Due to its labour intensive nature, the industry is considered risky with frequent and high accident rates and ill health problems among workers, practitioners and end users as well.

Construction sites are well-known as the most hazardous workplaces. There are a lot of activities in the construction sites using all sorts of material and techniques in daily work from simple material and manual work to machinery assisted jobs.

These activities pose a lot of hazards at the construction sites that need to be eliminated or controlled so that the construction workers may not suffer serious injuries and ill health because of bad working conditions.

Common hazards at construction sites include: High elevations, defective equipment, construction dusts, noise from the machinery, falling materials, sharp edges and uncovered openings among others.

“This is why it is very important to invest in occupational health and safety at construction sites. Maintaining good occupational health and safety practices is the responsibility of everyone at the construction sites,” OSHA maintains.
Joint efforts from the government, OSHA, contractors and the workers are an essential tool in maintaining occupational health and safety at the construction sites.

Osha enforces the Occupational health and safety Act, 2003 by giving instruction and recommendation to contractors on to best execute their activities without causing harm to the workers.

The contractor should implement occupational health and safety recommendations as given by the authority and the workers should comply with the company policy and supervise the implementation through their safety and health representatives and their committees.

The clients’ responsibility
In order to ensure consistency in compliance, the client is equally important in the implementation of good occupational health and safety practices as is obliged to provide funds for the purchase of protective gears and other occupational health and safety equipments.

The client is also responsible for the submission of construction drawings to OSHA for security review before commencement of any construction activities if they are to benefit from advice on issues such as sewerage disposal systems, electrical safety of the building, firefighting systems and emergency escape routes.

It’s paramount that occupational health and safety always begins at the planning stage (design stage), the building designer ought to consult OSHA during the initial stages to improve occupational health and safety implementation at the construction sites.

A good designer must consider safety and health aspects by designing adequate provision for fire systems, means of access and ingress in the building, emergency staircases and provisions for the disabled.

However, many contractors particularly of lower classes lack knowledge on OHS. They regard managing safety and health to be a burden on their part and as an addition to the cost of their projects.

Some local contractors have a tendency to ignore important issues and they lack seriousness in implementing occupational health and safety requirements.

A common excuse given by these contractors is blaming their lobourers for allegedly refusing to wear Personal Protective Equipments (PEP).

“Some workers only think of wages and ignore matters related to their safety and health and so they don’t care whether the job is risky or not,” they claim.

Most accidents at construction sites are not reported and data is missing on the types and frequency of accidents since they are not investigated to obtain answers that might be helpful to mitigate them.

Commenting, CEO of the Trans Autoparts TAPCO, ENG. Shabbir Khataw maintains that OSHA will help pass valuable knowledge and increase understanding on how to protect employees.

He urged employers and workers alike to follow the law to ensure the safety and health at the workplace is maintained at all times as recommended by OSHA.

OSHA
Since independence in 1961, occupational health and safety standards in Tanzania were provided for by the Factories Ordinance Cap. 297 of 1950. The government through the Public Service Reform Programme (PSRP) established Occupational Safety and Health Authority under the Executive Agency Act No. 30 of 1997.

Occupational Safety and Health Agency (OSHA) was officially launched on 31st August, 2001. It has been set up with the aim of improving the health and well being of workers, and of workplaces. This will be achieved by promoting occupational safety and health (OSH) practices in order to prevent occupational injuries and diseases, and ultimately achieve better productivity.

In any country, in order to improve productivity, among other things, health and safety of all workers need to be considered of high priority. In order to achieve this, a joint effort between the Government, Employers, Employees and the general public is needed.

The Tanzania working population is exposed to several new stress factors as a consequence of globalisation including the fast growing of construction and mining sectors.

In addition to the well-known traditional hazards, new problems of information technology, nanotechnology and manufactured nonmaterial, biological risks and biotechnology, chemical risks, new organisation of work and psychological stress are encountered by workers, managers and the experts.

All these problems require new strategies; new approaches and new competencies. OSHA can help by developing different approaches for ensuring prevention or minimization of such occupational hazards.

The Agency’s services extend to all workplaces as defined by the prevailing legislation i.e. the Occupational Health and Safety Act. No. 5 of 2003 and other subsidiary legislation.