ABSTRACT
The issue of industrial safety evolved concurrently with industrial development in Nigeria. The issue of industrial safety was marked by a shift from compensation to prevention as well as toward an increasing emphasis on addressing the long-term effects of occupational hazards. This emphasis was helped along by insurance companies who, in order to protect themselves from workers' compensation expenses, found that it made good business sense for them to promote industrial safety programs and research industrial safety issues. Today, industrial safety is widely regarded as one of the most important factors that any business, large or small, must consider in its operations. Lack of safety in organization will lead to low output, productivity of staff and eventual collapse of an organization. When an organization losses one to two staff as a result of industrial accidents, the workers become scared to work in such an organization. Apart from reducing productivity, the entire staff may lose confidence in the management to adequately protect them.
1. INTRODUCTION
Industrial safety is primarily a management activity which is concerned with reducing, controlling and eliminating hazards from the industries or industrial units. The issue of industrial safety evolved concurrently with industrial development in the United States. Of central importance was the establishment of protective legislation, most significantly the worker's compensation laws, enacted at the start of the twentieth century, and the Occupational Safety and Health Act, enacted in 1970.
The issue of industrial safety was marked by a shift from compensation to prevention as well as toward an increasing emphasis on addressing the long-term effects of occupational hazards. This emphasis was helped along by insurance companies who, in order to protect themselves from workers' compensation expenses, found that it made good business sense for them to promote industrial safety programs and research industrial safety issues. Today, industrial safety is widely regarded as one of the most important factors that any business, large or small, must consider in its operations.
Worker's compensation laws vary widely from state to state but have key objectives in common. Employers are required to compensate employees for work-related injuries or sickness by paying medical expenses, disability benefits, and compensation for lost work time. In return, workers are barred in many instances from suing their employers, a provision that protects employers from large liability settlements (of course, employers may still be found liable in instances where they are found guilty of neglect or other legal violations). In his Industrial Safety: Management and Technology, David Colling contended that "workmen's compensation laws have done more to promote safety than all other measures collectively, because employers found it more cost-effective to concentrate on safety than to compensate employees for injury or loss of life." 2. IMPORTANCE OF INDUSTRIAL SAFETY
The danger of life of human being is increasing with advancement of scientific development in different fields. The importance of industrial safety was realized because every millions of industrial accidents occur which result in either death or in temporary disablement or permanent disablement of employees and involve large amount of losses resulting from danger to property, wasted man hours and wasted hours. More ever, from managerial perspective the importance of industrial safety in any organization may be concluded by following facilitation:
a. Treatment: industrial safety management provides treatment for injuries and illness at the work place.
b.Medical Examination: it carries out medical examination of staff joining the organization or returning to work after sickness or accident.
c. Hazards identification
d.Provision of protective devices.
e. Consultancy: it provides medical advised on other condition potentially affecting health e.g. works canteen etc.
f. Education: it provides safety and health training.
3. OBJECTIVES OF INDUSTRIAL SAFETY:
i. To prevent accidents in the plant by reducing the hazard to minimum.
ii. To eliminate accident caused work stoppage and lost production.
iii. To achieve lower workmen’s compensation, insurance rates and reduce all other direct and indirect costs of accidents.
iv. To prevent loss of life, permanent disability and the loss of income of worker by eliminating causes of accidents.
v. To evaluate employee’s morale by promoting safe work place and good working condition.
vi. To educate all members of the organization in continuous state of safety mindedness and to make supervision competent and intensely safety minded.
A safety programmed includes mainly the following four E’s.
· Engineering: i.e safety at the design, equipment installation stage.
· Education: i.e. education of employees in safe practices.
· Enlistment: it concerns the attitude of the employees and management towards the programmed and its purpose.
· Encouragement: i.e. to enforce adherence to safe rules and practices.
4. THE CREATION OF OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY AND HEALTH ACT
One of the key developments in industrial safety legislation was the Occupational Safety and Health Act. The Act, which was the first comprehensive industrial safety legislation passed at the federal level, passed nearly unanimously. One of the factors contributing to strong support for the act was the rise in the number of work-related fatalities in the late 1960s. The Occupational Safety and Health Act was distinguished by its emphasis on the prevention of (rather than compensation for) industrial accidents and illnesses. Among the key provisions of the act were the development of mandatory safety and health standards, the enforcement of these standards, and standardized record-keeping and reporting procedures for businesses.
Issues regulations governing a wide range of worker safety areas, all intended to meet overriding principle that "each employer shall furnish to each of his employees employment and a place of employment which are free from recognized hazards that are causing or are likely to cause death or serious physical harm to his [or her] employees." The regulations include both safety standards, designed to prevent accidents, and health standards, designed to protect against exposure to toxins and to address the more long-term effects of occupational hazards. So-called "horizontal" standards apply to all industries whereas "vertical" standards apply to specific industries or occupations. 5.1 INDUSTRIAL HAZARDS
One of the important aspects of industrial safety programs is the identification of hazards. Managers typically determine hazards by the examination of accident records, interviews with engineers and equipment operators, and the advice of safety specialist. Industrial health hazards are typically categorized into three classes:
a. Chemical hazards, in which the body absorbs toxins;
c. Physical hazards, in which the worker is exposed to temperature extremes, atmospheric pressure, dangerous conditions, or excessive noise.
About one-tenth of industrial accidents result from operating machinery, and these accidents often result in severe injury. Among the most dangerous types of machinery are power presses and woodworking tools, which most commonly cause injury to the hands. A number of mechanisms have been developed to safeguard against such injuries. The simplest of these are barrier guards, in which the moving parts of machinery are enclosed in a protective housing. These safeguards are typically used in conjunction with sensors so that the machine cannot be operated without them. Other types of safeguards include those which prevent a machine from operating unless a worker has both hands properly in place, automated material feeding devices, warning labels, and color coding. Toxins are most commonly ingested through inhalation, and the most commonly inhaled substances are dust, fumes, and smoke. Toxins are also commonly absorbed through the skin, and this is a bigger problem than many business owners and managers realize. Indeed, some studies indicate that skin disorders result in approximately 200,000 lost working days each year. The most common of these disorders is dermatitis, which is particularly problematic in the food preparation and chemical industries. Among the most commonly-used toxins are industrial solvents. The toxicity of solvents varies widely by type, but the most toxic of these are carcinogens and can cause permanent damage to the nervous system through prolonged occupational overexposure. In addition, organic solvents, such as those made from petroleum, are often highly flammable. Tightly-fitted respirators with activated charcoal filters are used to protect against inhalation of organic solvents, particularly in spraying applications in which solvents are atomized. Ventilation systems comprised of fans and ducts are also used to control airborne toxins of all types. Rubber gloves are commonly used to prevent skin absorption of organic solvents. 5.2 IDENTIFYING SAFETY AND HEALTH HAZARDS
5.2.1 HAZARDS, RISKS, OUTCOMES
· A hazard is something that can cause harm if not controlled. · The outcome is the harm that results from an uncontrolled hazard.
· A risk is a combination of the probability that a particular outcome will occur and the severity of the harm involved. “Hazard”, “risk”, and “outcome” are used in other fields to describe e.g. environmental damage, or damage to equipment. However, in this context, “harm” generally describes the direct or indirect degradation, temporary or permanent, of the physical, mental, or social well-being of workers. For example, repetitively carrying out manual handling of heavy objects is a hazard. The outcome could be a musculoskeletal disorder (MSD) or an acute back or joint injury. The risk can be expressed numerically (e.g. a 0.5 or 50/50 chance of the outcome occurring during a year), in relative terms (e.g. "high/medium/low"), or with a multi-dimensional classification scheme (e.g. situation-specific risks). 5.2.2 HAZARD ASSESSMENT
Hazard analysis or hazard assessment is a process in which individual hazards of the workplace are identified, assessed and controlled/eliminated as close to source (location of the hazard) as reasonable and possible. As technology, resources, social expectation or regulatory requirements change, hazard analysis focuses controls more closely toward the source of the hazard. Thus hazard control is a dynamic program of prevention. Hazard-based programs also have the advantage of not assigning or implying there are "acceptable risks" in the workplace. A hazard-based program may not be able to eliminate all risks, but neither does it accept "satisfactory" (but still risky) outcomes. And as those who calculate and manage the risk are usually managers while those exposed to the risks are a different group, workers, a hazard-based approach can by-pass conflict inherent in a risk-based approach.
5.2.3 RISK ASSESSMENT
Modern occupational safety and health legislation usually demands that a risk assessment be carried out prior to making an intervention. It should be kept in mind that risk management requires risk to be managed to a level which is as low as is reasonably practical. This assessment should:
· Identify the hazards
· Identify all affected by the hazard and how
· Evaluate the risk
· Identify and prioritize appropriate control measures
The calculation of risk is based on the likelihood or probability of the harm being realized and the severity of the consequences. This can be expressed mathematically as a quantitative assessment (by assigning low, medium and high likelihood and severity with integers and multiplying them to obtain a risk factor), or qualitatively as a description of the circumstances by which the harm could arise. The assessment should be recorded and reviewed periodically and whenever there is a significant change to work practices. The assessment should include practical recommendations to control the risk. Once recommended controls are implemented, the risk should be re-calculated to determine of it has been lowered to an acceptable level. Generally speaking, newly introduced controls should lower risk by one level, i.e., from high to medium or from medium to low.
6. SMALL BUSINESSES AND INDUSTRIAL SAFETY
All companies, including small businesses, are required to keep records on various aspects of their operations that are relevant to employee safety and health. All employers are required to keep records regarding enforcement of industrial safety standards, research records, job-related injury, illness, death records, and job hazard records.
But while small businesses must adhere to many of the same regulations that govern the operations of larger companies, there also are several federal industrial safety programs available exclusively to smaller business enterprises, and safety regulatory agencies both enjoy some discretion in adjusting penalties for industrial safety violations for small companies. It also gives smaller firms greater flexibility in certain safety areas (i.e. lead in construction, emergency evacuation plans, process safety management) in recognition of their limited resources, and provides grants to non-profit groups with explicit mandates of addressing safety and health issues in small business settings.