Assessment of Occupational Safety and Health Management System in Some Federl Government Organizations
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Date
2011-05
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
Background: Annually, throughout the world, an estimated 271 million people suffer
from work related injuries, and 2 million die from the injury. In recent years, in
developed countries the occupational health and safety of workers has improved but it is
not true in developing countries. Ethiopia is categorized among under developed
countries and do not have much data on health and safety. But assessment made by the
Federal Civil Service Agency describes in 2000 E.C. that 14 males and 8 females died, 7
males and 8 females discharged from work due to disability and 6 males and 27 females’
transfers to other jobs due to various work place.
Objective: The objective of the study was to assess the Occupational Safety and Health
Management System (OSHMS) in fifty five Federal Government Organizations who
higher Occupational Safety and Health experts.
Methodology: An analytical research method was used to conduct the study in the
selected organizations because facts or information are already available, and analyze
these to a critical evaluation of the material. A total of 258 study subjects were randomly
selected from fifty organizations according to their civil servants number proportions and
fifty five Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) experts were directly selected from their
respective organizations. The data was collected using the questionnaires A, and B.
Questionnaire A was filled by OSH experts, questionnaire B filled by civil servants
where as interviews were made with some officials in the former Federal Civil Service
Agency and five Heads ,of Human Resource Managers of the surveyed organizations.
Both questionnaire were pre-tested for their accuracy and validation prior to the actual
study and the necessary adjustments were done accordingly. The data were entered after
being encoded and analyzed using frequencies percentages.
Results: The existence of Occupational hazards and disease are Physical (17.11%),
Chemical(16.49%),
Biological(22.92%),
Ergonomic(24.58%)
and
Psychological(18.87%). On the other hand degree of effectiveness Occupational Safety
and Health Management System (OSHMS) in fifty five Federal Government The finding was that most of the experts described that Occupational Safety and Health
Management System (OSHMS) in the surveyed organizations did not effectively
implement.
The major challenges are lack of awareness of top and middle level managements and
civil servants, insufficient or lack of budgetary support; failure to customizes OSHMS to
organizational needs; weak management commitment; lack of integration with general
management functions and systems and restricting OSH functions to OSH experts
Findings/Results The response of most civil servants also shows that they are not aware
about the practice or implementation of
Occupational Safety and Health Management
System (OSHMS) in their organizations . They described work injuries occurred in the
past 12 months were broken bones /fracture 10%, concussion/ internal injuries14.78%,
burns/scalds5.21%, eye injury/ eye strain22.17%, asphyxia /lack of oxygen18.69%,
sprain, strain, dislocation6.08%, electric shock5.65%, acute poisoning exposure to
toxic8.26% and others 9.13%. Out of total respondents 10(3.90%) receive, 223(87.10%)
did not receive medical treatment while 23(8.98%) cannot say any. Absentees from work
in the same period was 12(8.00%)
less than 2, 23(15.33%)
2-4, 11(7.33%)
4-
6,40(26.66%) 6-8, 39(26.00%) 25 and (16.66%) greater than 10 days.
The result of interviews with Heads, of Human Resource Management also indicates that
the application of Occupational Safety and Health Management System (OSHMS) with
general management practice was not employed in their organizations.
Conclusions and recommendations: Some occupational hazards were indentified in the
surveyed organizations. Besides effective Occupational Safety and Health Management
System (OSHMS) is not in place in the surveyed organizations as conclusion.
Recommendations were implementation of occupational safety and health according to
proclamation No 515/2006 Article 47-56. In addition to this commitment of management
to a successful OSHMS in the work place, allocate sufficient resources (financial and
human) for the proper
functioning of occupational safety and health program
Description
Keywords
Federl government organizations