worldsteel Safety and Health Recognition Programme 2017

As part of its commitment to the highest safety and health standards, the World Steel Association (worldsteel) recognises excellence in four of its member companies for delivering demonstrable improvements in safety and health for steel industry employees.

Andrew Purvis, Director, Safety, Health and Environment, said, “Our Board of Directors have made the clear statement that nothing is more important than the safety and health of the people who work in our industry. The purpose of the safety and health excellence recognition programme is to share the best practices developed by the leaders in safety and health management. I wish to personally congratulate and thank the leaders of the four recognised organisations for their ongoing commitment to, and achievements in safety and health management. Through your support of this process the whole industry can move forward in safety and health.”

The recognised practices of the member companies are assessed on four criteria:

  • How the organisation demonstrates the application of the six worldsteel safety and health principles
  • Metrics used to test the project or system have a positive impact on the organisation’s injury statistics
  • Improvement in maturity level on the Bradley scale
  • Relevance and applicability to other worldsteel members.

The recognised member companies are:

Hadeed, Saudi Arabia – Process Safety Management implementation: Hadeed’s PSM incorporates a procedure on ‘Process safety incident reporting and investigation’. It requires the reporting, classification, investigation, analysis and recordkeeping of Process Safety Incidents to enable pro-active corrections to be made. Employees are also encouraged to register and report all process safety abnormalities in the form of ‘Observations’ or ‘Near Misses’ through an incident reporting and investigation online platform.

Liberty OneSteel, Australia – The goal zero: Every Body, Every Day safety engagement programme: In developing the programme, surveys of employees were conducted to establish baseline information, their preferred communication methods and presentation styles, as well as their interests and motivations. Data on site injury trends was also collected. Using all of this information the management team developed and delivered various engagement workshops over an eight-week period. Following the programme the site has seen an increase in minor accident reporting and near miss reporting, indicating a greater level of safety ownership amongst the workgroup.

Tata Steel, Thailand – Contractor Safety Management: Despite a well-established framework for Contractor Safety Management (CSM), incident investigations and site audits frequently revealed gaps in effective implementation. While improvements are now taking place across all units of the Tata Steel Group, Tata Steel Thailand (TSTh) took a pioneering role in the programme’s deployment across India and South East Asia. After the implementation of CSM two years ago, TSTh achieved zero Lost Time Injuries (404 days) for both contractors and employees. Contractor Lost Time Injury Frequency Rate and First Aid Cases also decreased significantly.

Usiminas, Brazil – Safe Hands Project: The Safe Hands Project began in 2013 in order to mitigate the fact that hand injuries account for 41% of work accidents in Brazil, a number that was even higher at Usiminas, at 42%. The project aimed to encourage employees to identify the tasks they perform that exposed their hands to risk, and propose a new or existing tool to prevent the risk. Since the project started five years ago, it has achieved significant results. First of all, employee engagement: 1,300 projects have been presented. The frequency of accidents involving hands has been reduced by 46%, which has led to the project being introduced in other company units.

More detailed information on each of these initiatives can be found in the Safety and Health Recognition Programme 2017 publication at worldsteel.org, along with information on worldsteel’s other safety programmes.

The recognised companies were presented with a certificate at the worldsteel General Assembly in Brussels. Photos can be accessed on the worldsteel Flickr site.

  • The World Steel Association (worldsteel) is one of the largest and most dynamic industry associations in the world. worldsteel members represent approximately 85% of the world’s steel production, including over 160 steel producers with 9 of the 10 largest steel companies, national and regional steel industry associations, and steel research institutes.