NATIONAL SAFETY POLICY

Sun, 01 Oct 2017 09:58:28 +0000

HAVING a weak policy is better than having no policy. A national policy shows government’s intentions and commitments. That way, you can hold government accountable against its own words. Most importantly the policy helps citizens to know how they contribute towards the realisation of the policy. So what is contained in the national safety policy and how can you be part of it?

There was great jubilation among safety practitioners when President Edgar Chagwa Lungu announced last week on parliament radio that the Ministry of Labour and Social Security is concluding working on the National Occupational Safety and Health Policy. What was even more exciting was when the Permanent Secretary of Ministry of Labour, Barnaby Mulenga, stated that, through his office, government will ensure that Zambia Occupational Health and Safety Association (ZOHSA) gets regulated by an Act of Parliament.

Since its establishment in 2010, ZOHSA has been lobbying government to become a legal professional body regulated by an Act of Parliament like the Engineering Institute of Zambia (EIZ). Finally government has accepted. This means that ZOHSA will be mandated by laws to regulate all safety professionals and companies will be allowed to employed qualified safety offers who are registered by ZOHSA.

If you want to join ZOHSA, get in touch with me on the details at the end of this article. I was part of the successful meeting ZOHSA had with the PS last week. The director of Occupational Safety and Health Services Department under Ministry of Labour, Chivunda Kakoma, while officiating at the Safety Conference last month, emphasised that the National Safety Policy has drafted.  Seeing the strong political will towards safety through the formulation of the national safety policy is so thrilling to all safety lovers. National safety policy must be support.

A national policy is an action plan which defines the road map government intends to take. That is my simplified definition. I know technocrats have their own polished definition. Government works within the policy framework.

Without a policy, government can’t do anything on a particular issue. To bring development, government takes three steps which are policy formulation, develop the legal framework and establish institutions to enforce the laws and regulations.

This makes business sense. In business language, the policy is the plan, the laws and regulations are the strategies and measures to guide the plan and the institution is the team to implement the plan. Each step is crucial to ensure success. A wrong plan will produce wrong results.

Since independence, Zambia has never had any national safety policy. (As my practice has been, I refer to Occupational Safety and Health as simply safety in all my articles). The national safety policy, which is being developed, is the first of its kind. The lack of a national safety policy is the major reason why safety standards in Zambia are so poor.

As a nation, we have been existing without direction on safety. The current inherited safety laws from colonial masters like the factories are obsolete, outdated and weak. The safety laws are fragmented and they often overlap with each other making enforcement by regulators difficulty. As a result some employers subject workers to work in unsafe and unhealthy work environment and manage to get away with it. This will soon come end.

In the last few years, Zambia has witnessed renewed enthusiasm and effort to improve the safety standards in workplaces. The following are some of the notable developments.

In 2010, the Zambia Occupational Safety and Health Act was enacted. In the same year, ZOHSA was established by a number of passionate safety professionals.  A number of colleges and universities started offering Occupational Safety and Health courses which has resulted in increased number of qualified safety professionals.

Universities like University of Africa based in Lusaka offers safety programmes up to Master’s Degree level. In 2012, International Labour Organisation (ILO) conducted a research in Zambia and produced two research reports.  One of them was simply the Profile on Safety explaining how safety is managed at national level.

The second one focused on the Recording and Notification of Occupational Accidents and Diseases in Zambia indicating the reporting system and the extent of accidents in Zambia.  The ILO reports made important recommendations to government. Among them, ILO recommended the formulation of the national safety policy and ratification of some key ILO conventions.

In 2014, Zambia ratified four more ILO conventions. These are Occupational Safety and Health Convention, promotional framework on Occupational Safety and Health convention, Labour Inspection Convention and Labour Inspection (Agriculture) Convention.

One of the requirements of Occupational Safety and Health Convention is that member states must establish a national safety policy. Hence Zambia is obliged to develop a national safety policy. The government through the Ministry of Labour embarked on the journey of formulating the national safety policy. Currently the national policy is at draft stage awaiting to be finalised and submitted to cabinet for approval.

Let us look at some of the things contained in the National safety Policy. The purpose of this article is not to reproduce the National Safety Policy but to simply highlight key features. I will paraphrase in my own words so that even an ordinary person can understand.

The draft national safety policy aims to achieve 15 specific objectives. These objectives are as follows. The first one is to guide the development of safety laws and regulations. The current safety laws need to be reviewed and harmonised to improve safety standards in our country.

The second objective is to establish and strengthen responsible institutions to manage safety. Zambia has a number of safety regulators which include OSH Services Department under the Ministry of Labour, Mines Safety Department under Ministry of Mines, OSH Institute under Ministry of Health and Workers Compensation Fund Control Board among others.

These safety regulators need to be strengthened to make enforcement of safety laws effective. The third objective is to recommend safety enforcement and compliance mechanisms. Most employers violate safety laws in our country without facing prosecution. The fourth objective is to create mechanism for cooperation between employers and workers.

The fifth objective is to strengthen capacities of all stakeholders in occupational safety and health. The sixth objective is to mobilise resources for implementation of the national safety policy. The seventh objective is to initiate programmes to disseminate safety information and services. The eighth objective is to put in place programmes to raise safety awareness.

The ninth objective is to strengthen research capacity in safety. The tenth to develop a comprehensive safety information system. The eleventh objective is to initiate support programmes for improvement of safety in SMEs and informal sector of the economy. The twelfth objective is to collaborate with relevant insurance or social security schemes.

The collaboration will offer compensation and rehabilitation services to workers who suffer occupational accidents and diseases. The thirteenth objective is to mainstream safety in all learning institutions. The fourteenth objective is to institutionalise social dialogue and partnership on occupational safety and health. Lastly to mainstream safety in all development issues.

The National Safety Policy states 10 key measures and strategies to be undertaken to achieve the policy objectives. The first one is the establishment of a Safety Authority. The Safety Authority will be responsible for ensuring effective coordination on safety matters in the country among all stakeholders.

The second one is the development of preventative safety culture. This will be achieved by implementing safety which is sensitive to the unique needs of various sectors. It will also involve strengthening safety structures, promoting accident prevention measures, integrating safety into school curriculum, creating safety awareness and commemorating the World Safety Day.

The third one is the development of mechanism for improvement of safety law enforcement. Government plans to make this a reality by recruiting and retaining qualified and competent safety inspectors in safety institutions. It will also involve supporting formation of joint safety committees for SMEs and establishing an award system for best safety performers.

The fourth one is promotion of appropriate safety training. Government hope to achieve this by ensuring institutions of higher education provide stand-alone safety programmes, promoting workplace safety training and mainstreaming safety in the education curricula at all levels of learning. The fifth one is the development of framework for harmonising and strengthening the safety laws.

The sixth one is developing mechanisms for strengthening financial capacity of safety institutions. This will be achieved by encouraging employers to allocate sufficient resources towards safety activities and also ensuring government provides adequate funding to support safety institutions. The seventh one is establishing accident notification and recording system. Government intends to achieve this by having a central place for recording and notification of occupational accidents and diseases.

The eighth one is promotion of research in safety by publishing and disseminating research findings, designing a national research model and designing training packages. The ninth one is the provision of occupational health services. To achieve this, government plans to build capacity to detect health hazards and risks, ensure medical surveillance and promote the integration occupational health in the medical training programmes. The last one is the provision of facilities for workers with disabilities by implementing provisions of ergonomically friendly facilities for people with disabilities in workplaces.

However careful analysis of the national safety policy reveals that there is room for improvement. The following are some of the weaknesses which should be addressed before the final draft is presented to parliament. The first one is that the policy is biased towards Occupational Safety and Health only. Workplace safety is not the only safety that Zambia needs.

The safety policy has not mentioned government’s intention to improve safety in our homes and markets. How many homes are gutted in fire every year which could have been avoided if homes where fitted with fire extinguishers? The national safety policy should encompass not just workplace safety but public safety also. Just like we have the Public Health Act, we need the Public Safety Act.

Alternatively we can combine Public Health and Public Safety into one law as Public Health and Safety Act, just like we have Occupational Health and Safety Act. The second weakness is that the policy has said nothing about emergency preparedness and response. At national level, we need effective strategies to respond to emergencies.

We have reduced Fire brigade to just fighting fires and retrieving abandoned babies from pit-latrines.  They can do more. We need to empower them so that they can respond to any emergency including chemical spills. Honestly if Zambia can buy 42 fire trucks, can we fail to buy a single helicopter to respond to road traffic accidents and evacuate casualties in good time?

I wish to commend government and all other stakeholders who participated in developing the national safety policy. Its contents show that it took great effort and time to develop it. The best thing about this draft policy is that it covers all workers across all industries. We all need to support this policy. We need to take ownership of the policy and turn it into reality. Until next week, stay safe. Zambia needs you.

The author is the CEO of SafetyFocus, a safety company committed to providing safety training, consultancy and supplying of safety products.

For your comments, contact the author on cell +260 975 255770 or email: marksucceed@gmail.com

Mark Kunda—Safety Consultant