Challenges in incorporating safety and health into national plans:
Between policy and practice in Lebanon
Manal Azzi, PhD
SafeWork
Implementing Occupational Safety and Health Standards GloballyInternational ILO ConferenceDüsseldorf, Germany3-6 November 2009
OUTLINE
• Background:– Occupational safety and health (OSH)– Lebanon
• Objectives• Methods• Sampling• Tool design• Data Collection• Results
Questions
• How effective is the law?
• How effective is a national policy on OSH? What do managers think of OSH?
• Is there a gap between policy and practice in Lebanon?
• What are the dynamics that drive a manager to ensure a safe and healthy workplace?
Background
• Occupational Safety and Health (OSH)– The Scope of the Problem
• Lebanon– Socioeconomic context– OSH in Lebanon– Stakeholders– Legislation– Knowledge Attitude and Practice
Comparison internationally
Lebanon under the bombs2007-2008
Objectives
• To assess the dynamics affecting the implementation of safety measures at the workplace– role of knowledge, attitude and behaviour of
employers in this regard.
• To identify shortcomings in translating the policies to implementation in the OSH domain in Lebanon
• To give recommendations that would assist policymakers and improve OSH in Lebanon.
Research Question
• What factors at the enterprise level can play a role in either facilitating or impeding adherence to safety measures?– How are employer knowledge and attitude driving
occupational safety and health practice?– Why are managers motivated or uninspired to
implement health and safety legislation?– As part of the enterprise level OSH practice, to what
extent are the articles pertaining to the National Decree 11802 and the ILO convention 155 being implemented at the level of enterprises?
Methods• Cross-sectional study was conducted on the employers from 70
work organizations. • Randomly selected from a list of 234 member industries of the ALI,
covering the top 5 largest industrial sectors in Lebanon: minerals, metals, chemical products, paper and cardboard, and food products.
• A mixed methods approach
• Each employer was visited once– asked to complete an interview using a close-ended questionnaire. – An in-depth qualitative interview was used to probe into the
questionnaire responses for 32 employers (data saturation point). Notes were taken during each interview, then translated and transcribed.
– The analysis of the quanti. data generated the main points of interest and the quali. analysis allowed the generation of new themes
Questionnaire Design• Structured questionnaire
– Key informant interviews, literature, Lebanese National OSH Decree 11802 and the ILO OSH convention 155.
• Questionnaire covered Socio-demographics, employer’s knowledge and awareness of OSH legislations, employer’s attitude towards OSH , & employer's practices relating to: physical health, psychosocial health, communication of OSH policies within the workplace, exposure to occupational hazards, training, accident documentation and notification etc.
• The results were analyzed using descriptive statistics including means and standard deviations for continuous variables and frequency distributions for categorical variables.
Key InformantsInterviews
General Federation for Lebanese Workers
Association of Lebanese Industrialists
Ministry of Labour: labour Inspector
In-depth interview scopeEmployer perception of worker attitudes and practices;
Employer perception of safety ;
Employer awareness of national OSH decree and reasons why they haven’t heard of the decree 11802;
The incentives for management to implement safety measures;
The reasons for non or partial implementation of safety measures at the enterprise level;
Relationship with Ministry of Labour (MOL);
The reasons why OSH is a priority or not.
A thematic analysis of the in-depth interviews was conducted resultingin higher order themes
Data Collection
ISO certificates
Manufacturing procedure neatly displayed
Where signs exist, they are not in a language workers can understand, or are not pertinent where they are placed
Dangerous work with no PPE and no safeguards
Vs. Neat electrical boxes and storage
Very chaotic workplaces
Steep entrance of a printing industry
Confined spaces Unhealthy and unsafe storage sites
Small toilet space, bad hygienic conditions & used also as locker Vs.
Good Locker space for workers
Workers resting on the floor Vs. Good cafeteria space and seats
Quantitative Results
Awareness of OSH Legislation
91.4%
87.1%
81.2%
76.0%78.0%80.0%82.0%84.0%86.0%88.0%90.0%92.0%94.0%
Head of enterprises notaware that the ILO has
conventions onOccupational Safety and
Health (OSH)
Head of enterprises notaware of the national OSH
Decree No 11802endorsed by the
government in 2005
Establishment doesn'thave a written occupational
safety and health policy
Pe
rce
nta
ge
Workplace Policy on OSH
What enterprises used as guidelines to set their workplace OSH polices
Employer’s attitude towards occupational safety and health
OSH as a priority in spite of high ignorance on OSH
Motivation for providing OSH at the workplace
69.6%
52.2%
0.0%8.8%
29.0%
55.1%
0.0%
10.0%
20.0%
30.0%
40.0%
50.0%
60.0%
70.0%
80.0%
Safety ofemployees
means higherproductivity
Improvesimage of the
company
Employeesrequested thatthe companygets involved
in OSH
To abide bynational OSHregulations
To respectinternational
safetystandards
Ethics-care forworkers
Pe
rce
nta
ge
Factors impeding enterprises from providing OSH
15.9%
49.3%
21.7%
17.4%
24.6%
11.6%
5.8%
7.2%
0.0% 10.0% 20.0% 30.0% 40.0% 50.0% 60.0%
Lack of budget
Lack of in formation on safety andhealth and related measures
Too much w ork w hich does notallow concentration on OSH issues
Lack of aw areness of OSHimportance
Workers' non compliance
Economic and political instability
Ignorance and no risk perception-assessment
Lack of management follow up
Pe
rce
nta
ge
Practices relating to safety and health: Communication of OSH policies within the workplace
Communication and training for workers on OSH
Practices relating to safety and health: Communication of OSH policies
within the workplace
Relation and communication between the enterprises and the Ministry of Labour
Accident documentation
Analyzing Quali Data
Reasons managers consider OSH as a priority
- Increase productivity- Give/ get something in return- Decrease absenteeism- Worker as a valuable human resource- More sales- Give and take
- Ethical reasons- Respect to human being- We are family
- Responsibility of employer- Basic duty of employer
- Plant reputation- Multi-national/ mother company audits- Image of company- International companies
- Moral obligations- Family values- Valuing the human
- Productivity and resources- Equity theory
Sense of duty
Globalization and occupational safety
1st Order Theme
Meanin-gful Units
Higher Order Theme
Qualitative ResultsThemes Sub-themes
Globalization and occupational safety and healthInternational standards certification and its effect on Safety and health
Relation between employers and national OSH stakeholders and reflection of national priorities on enterprise management
Lack of trust in the local government and its services and no information dissemination
Deficient expertise and lack of national guidelines in the field of OSH
Economic and political Instability
Knowledge and attitude of employers towards OSH
Lack of knowledge about certain legislations is a major factor for not implementing them
Management commitment and involvement affected by their attitude to safety and health (Ignorance/risk perception)
Valuing the human being We are a family
Company Image
Safety of employees implies higher productivity
Employer perception of workers’ attitude towards OSH
Victim blaming approachSafety Behaviour Macho Concept and Risk behaviour Culture of being lax about safety
OSH practices affected by the level of employer OSH knowledge and attitude
Communication with employeesTraining on OSH
Results & Discussion
• Few work organizations in the representative sample implemented OSH law in Lebanon.
• Major factors which impeded or encouraged employers to adopt safety and health measures– Employers lack of awareness on safety and health
and its provisions; – Employer’s low perception of worker’s capacity to
implement safety and health measures; – low cultural value given to prevention processes in
Lebanon.
Main Findings
• The provisions of ILO OSH Conventions and National OSH decrees do not reach the enterprises, which are ideally, the audience the law is meant to benefit: – The enterprises are not aware a national OSH decree
exists; it is not accessible to employers and not promoted.
– In the rare cases that the decree reaches the enterprise, it is generally discarded because relevance is not understood.
– There is no communication between government (Ministry of Labour and its inspection arm), employer associations and enterprises.
Main Findings (Cont’d)
• Motivators– Enterprise OSH management systems that are recognized in the
international market are more appealing to employers because they are hands on, provide certificates and hence improve the company’s image and raise their competitive profile i.e. increasing productivity.
– This is also apparent in the fact that where workplace OSH policies do exist, they are never based on the national decree. Instead, they are either based on similar companies’ policies worldwide or they are the result of trial and error and institutional memory.
– Employers in Lebanon and the region value the human being and family; this is an important drive to protect their workers.
– Workers who are safe and healthy will keep working, which will increase productivity.
Main Findings (Cont’d)Inhibitors• Management lack awareness on occupational safety and health: its
core matter, its relevance and significance in the workplace. • There is no perception of risk or risk assessment.
– workers who have very low education are not worth training on OSH and will not understand it
– even if they were to enforce safety and health measures, there is high worker non-compliance
– direct link between a safe and healthy environment and productivity is just not clear; the benefits don’t seem to be tangible.
– Lower management complain that there is no higher management commitment, some good initiatives start, but there is no follow-up.
– There is the real work to do which makes money and pays salaries to worry about, rather than the conditions of work, which are secondary.
– Economic and political instability bring the priorities down to the basic needs of survival, in light of which, OSH is considered a luxury.
– Ignorance leads to the lax attitude management have towards occupational safety and health. This in turn results in poor safety and health practices.
Conclusion
• A proposed strategy– build on the motivators of employers in
Lebanon and the region whilst answering to the hesitations and misconceptions which impede implementation.
• More future research needs to target workers’ safety and health KAP to find consistencies and inconsistencies with management beliefs.
International OSH standards and globalization
Community Culture: Non-preventive culture: where safety not a priority, making quick money comes 1st. OSH should not be a luxury but a need even in unstable economic situations
National Influences: Political & economic instability. OSH is a wise investment regardless of national instabilities
Ministry of labourGives no incentives or support to employers and they have a competitive regional market
Tax free & approval of only OSH friendly projects at their licensing phase
National law should have guiding and practical nature as compared to ISOCompensation systems require prevention
Trade Unions (sector syndicates should be informed & trained)
Employer Association & Chamber of commerce (member industries should be informed & trained)
Build trust & share knowledge (Bulletin, brochure, website, email), training for management on OSH and on decree, simplify decree), with the help of OSH Institutes.Communication strategy
Worker attitude and behaviour influenced by management attitude and behaviour
Management perception of worker: Worker low education means no use training them and blames worker for risky behaviourIf so many accidents are due to human error as employers put it, then to avoid accidents, tasks have to be fitted to “human limitations” and taken care of in the design phaseInternationally recognised OSH management systems--link to profitOSH focal pts. trained on OSH in order for OSH decrees not to be brushed asideProper promotion of PPEs by sensitizing workers to risk perception and removal of barriers
Enterprise (management):Lack OSH awareness lax attitude & Performance pressureTraining on OSH
Don’t count the number of policies you have…
count who is implementing them…
and then ask why
Top Related