DARE - Because Entrepreneurs Do

With increasing workforce and the rising importance of safety measures, industrial safety has become a safe bet

As India establishes itself as an economic superpower, the country is catching up with the rest of the world in terms of improving the working conditions of millions of its workers.

Rising incomes and exposure to international work standards is bringing in a change in the way Indian companies look at workplace safety, opening up a market for those specializing in providing safety equipment and services.

Compared to more developed countries, the industrial safety market in India is still in its infancy, mainly due to enforcement issues. The European Union (EU) for example, has a far better track record of enforcing safety laws than India. Though India has no dearth of laws like The Indian Factories Act, The Indian Explosives Act and The Building and other Construction Workers Safety and Welfare Act of 1996, very little of it is put into practice.

DARE/ILO & WHO

International Labor Organization (ILO) and the World Health Organization (WHO) define occupational health as: “Occupational health should aim at: the promotion and maintenance of the highest degree of physical, mental and social well-being of workers in all occupations; the prevention amongst workers of departures from health caused by their working conditions; the protection of workers in their employment from risks resulting from factors adverse to health; the placing and maintenance of the worker in an occupational environment adapted to his physiological and psychological capabilities; and, to summarize, the adaptation of work to man and of each man to his job.”

“These Acts speak about employee safety in their purview. However, when it comes to implementation, many companies fail to adhere to them,” agrees the spokesperson for Maytas Infra Ltd., one of the few Indian companies that have implemented a comprehensive safety, health and environment (SH&E) program for their workers.

DARE/10 most dangerous jobs

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the top 10 most dangerous jobs are:

1. Timber cutters

2. Airplane pilots

3. Construction laborers

4. Truck drivers

5. Farm occupations

6. Groundskeepers

7. Laborers

8. Police and detectives

9. Carpenters

10. Sales occupations

Safety first?
According to the law, it is the responsibility of an employer to make sure that no catastrophe befalls his or her employees during work hours. However, despite the abundance of laws, the market for providing industrial safety equipment and services has lagged due to lack of compliance by companies.

The scene, however, is changing, says Ramdas Ugale, owner of Shree Sai Associates, a Mumbai-based safety and compliance consultant. “Developed markets like UK and US have a very mature safety market. In India it is just starting out. Not only are new products being launched, but even new sectors are coming up. Employers are realizing the importance of industrial safety programs and spending more and more on them,” he points out.

According to The World Bank, 80 million new entrants are expected to join the formal manufacturing sector of India over the next decade. The construction sector alone employs about 31 million persons currently—second only to agriculture in terms of employment, according to an estimate by the Construction Industry Development Council. With that, India’s working population (with an age bracket of 15-60) is set to overtake China’s in the next decade.

DARE/safety equipment

Various body parts protection equipment like shields for head, face, ear, eye, and hand

Height safety equipment

Industrial heat protection garments and accessories like helmets, welding helmets, etc.

Respiratory protection

Furnace observation cobalt blue glass

Emergency showers like eye-wash fountain, etc.

Industrial safety shoes

Marine/offshore equipment

Welding, cutting equipment and accessories

Fire-fighting equipment and accessories

Another report suggests that the manufacture of machinery and equipment other than transport equipment has contributed to the maximum number of accidents during the year 2005, making the want of safety equipment in manufacturing units very plain.

Safe opportunities
Industrial safety provides two opportunities—that of manufacturing safety equipment for businessmen who deal with heavy machines and of providing training and consultancy services to the workforce. Companies manufacturing industrial safety equipment get most of their clients from the construction industry; while training and consultancy firms have a wider range of clients to choose from.

For manufacturers of safety equipment most of the demand comes from the manufacturing and construction industries. The service industry contributes the least amount of business, thanks to the lower risk of traumatic physical injury in the sector. The major wares produced by safety equipment makers are different types of shields, masks, height safety equipment and devices for protection in inhospitable work areas, such as under the sea, in mines, etc.

DARE/training & consultancy

Training and consultancy services provided by NSCI

- Chemical emergency prevention, preparedness and response

- Electrical safety

- Occupational health and safety

- Safety audits

- Risk assessment and HAZOP studies

- Safety awareness surveys

- Disaster management services

- OHSMS

- Safety in material handling

- Environmental legislation in India

- Fire prevention and control in industry and business establishments

- Identification of hazards and risk control

- Testing and examination of lifting machines, tackles and pressure vessels

The second opportunity in the field of industrial safety is in providing training and consultancy services to workers. Training is provided from general workers to top management, covering supervisors and safety committees at organizations.

Besides teaching obvious precautions related to dangers such as physical injury, fire etc, training service providers in the manufacturing and construction sector also show workers how to handle their equipment in such a way that there is minimum amount of stress on their bodies.

KC Gupta, Director General, National Safety Council of India, says more and more companies are volunteering for such training, assessment and certification programs. “As more and more companies are entering into joint ventures with partners abroad or getting foreign investments, both their responsibilities towards their workers and the pressure to complete projects on time have increased. In order to make their workforce competent to attain these new standards, many companies are coming to organizations like ours.”

In addition to providing training, organizations like NSCI also sometimes help their clients in getting their compliance documents in place.

The hurdles
All European Union countries have their own regulatory authorities whose function is to enforce the basic legal occupational safety and health (OSH) standards in their respective states. It is one of the biggest reasons that the industrial safety market operates on a much larger scale than India.

Though India also has its own set of acts and enforcement agencies, the compliance on the part of companies is very lax. But with globalization opening more options for the workforce with higher standards of work norms, the Indian industry is also pulling up its socks. “If the compliance increases, we’ll have ten times more demand than we have now,” says Gupta of NSCI.

Another challenge for the industry is getting qualified manpower. Most industrial safety companies make do with engineering graduates with some work experience in the safety industry. Thus the requirement for specialized manpower makes it difficult for these companies to get a ready and well qualified workforce.

However, the good thing is that like India’s economic boom, the industrial safety market is also very young. Most of the players have just entered the market and many Indian companies are beginning to realize that in a global marketplace, they have to adhere to global standards in the workplace too. The industrial safety industry seems set for a bright, and safe, future.

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