23 - 29 August 2001
Issue No.548
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Al-Ahram Weekly Online 23 - 29 August 2001 Issue No.548 |
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Who protects the workers?
A recent spate of industrial accidents has shown that legislation is only part of what is needed to protect workers from occupational hazards, reports Gihan Shahine
Ask any worker whether he is safe at work and chances are that his response will be unequivocal. Ask any employer if he is applying occupational health and safety standards and "yes" is the inevitable answer. Alternatively, ask an official for statistics on work-related accidents and the response is likely to be that there are no comprehensive records.
A recent series of accidents, however, makes the issue of industrial accidents hard to ignore. In mid-June, Civil Defence forces put out a massive fire in a chemical and paint warehouse. Only weeks later, on 23 June, a fire broke out in a ceramics factory in Fayoum, claiming the lives of 11 workers and seriously injuring 22. Police investigations attributed the accident to a gas leakage that occurred while the substance was delivered to the factory -- a tragic accident that could have been prevented by the adoption of safety precautions. Then on 26 July, a fire broke out at a particle board factory in Alexandria.
The three incidents took place in a span of less than two months. But press reports put the number of industrial fires at 300,000 to 400,000 a year, causing estimated annual losses of more than LE100 million.
Alongside economic losses is the less quantifiable human suffering caused by such accidents. The director-general of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) puts it thus: "The right to life is the most fundamental right. Yet every year 1.2 million men and women are deprived of that right by occupational accidents and work-related disease."
That, perhaps, is what urged the ILO to organise a recent three-day workshop in Cairo directed at developing an action plan to ensure that chemicals are safely used in work places and to prevent major industrial accidents, in particular those involving hazardous substances. That plan is meant to help decision-makers enhance national policies regarding occupational safety and health (OSH).
The workshop saw the participation of at least 50 experts in OSH from the Ministry of Manpower and Migration, the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), and the Ministry of Health and Population (MOHP), along with representatives from employers' and workers' organisations.
The ILO estimates that every year 250 million workers are injured in occupational accidents and 160 million are struck by occupational diseases worldwide. The economic loss due to accidents and diseases related to the workplace is equivalent to 4 per cent of the sum of the gross national product of all countries -- several times the total official development aid available to developing countries.
As is often the case in controversial matters, there are no dependable statistics for occupational accidents and work-related diseases in Egypt, but the figures available are telling. According to the latest estimates provided by the Ministry of Manpower and Migration, 31.9 of every 1,000 laborers in various economic activities had job related injuries during 1998. During that same year there were 150 fatalities due to the accidents and 671 people were permanently disabled. (Official figures set the total number of industrial workers in 1998 at an astoundingly low 1,759,324). Accidents and illness resulted in 1,103,640 days of absences during that same year.
Experts, however, insist that the number of occupational accidents and fatalities is far larger than official figures. Many accidents go unreported; others are not classified as work-related. And when incidents occur in small and micro enterprises and in the informal sector, which represents a significant portion of the country's economic activities, they seldom make it into official tallies. This situation is particularly worrisome given that conditions are often very poor in these smaller entities and workers employed in them are excluded from legal protections and insurance schemes.
"The most hazardous of all economic activities are those involving the use of chemical substances; and in this regard, small enterprises pose a major hazard to labour," warns Dr Mahmoud Amr, professor of Industrial Medicine and Occupational Diseases at Qasr Al-Aini, who is also director of the National Centre for Toxicological Research and president of the non-governmental Scientific Society for Pesticides.
"Small chemical factories, which employ between 2 and 500 workers, remain largely beyond the reach of inspection," Amr laments. "There are, for instance, no less than 1,000 lead foundries [in Greater Cairo], poisoning not only their workers but also people living nearby."
In the absence of safety precautions, handling chemical substances can lead to numerous chronic diseases, disabilities and, ultimately, death. Cancer is often attributed to exposure to chemicals, and contact with these has been linked to lung, skin, liver and kidney problems, says Amr.
"Egypt has 18 million workers, if each takes 10 days off a year due to work-related injuries or illnesses, then we will have an annual loss of at least LE20 billion, considering that one worker should produce between LE10 to LE20 per working hour," Amr contends.
The ILO has been working to reduce the incidence of occupational accidents and diseases and improve work conditions through encouraging Egypt to sign several international conventions on OSH. Already Egypt is signatory to four such conventions.
But as Egypt considers the ratification of an additional two of the organisations' OSH conventions -- one of these concerns protecting workers from hazards surrounding the use of chemicals in the workplace, while the other concerns protecting the public from industrial accidents -- the question arises as to whether more legislation is really the solution.
Many experts agree that Egyptian legislation, which already largely conforms with the conventions, should guarantee safe and secure working conditions.
"The problem is not with legislation, but with enforcement," complains Maha Rakha a chemist at the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH).
Experts concur that enforcement of the laws is very lax and violations are rarely penalised. Although many authorities are involved in inspection, their work suffers from a lack of coordination and as a result, they apply different standards. Added to this, neither small factories nor agricultural activities -- in which the most hazardous of all economic activities dealing with chemicals are carried out -- are covered by Egyptian legislation to protect workers.
"The ministries of manpower and the environment, for instance, have different criteria for permissible levels of pollutants and lists of hazardous substances. This creates conflict in the enforcement of laws," Rakha explains.
Experts agree that there is pressing need for a unified safety data sheet for use of chemicals. According to Mohamed Shahine, director of NIOSH, each year approximately 400 new chemicals become available on the local market in which no less than 100,000 chemical substances are already available.
"Neither the importer nor the chemical manufacturer provide data sheets [on the composition, handling procedures and dangers of the substance], leaving both employers and inspectors in the dark," complains Shahine.
That, however, may be changing soon. The Egyptian Environmental Affairs Agency established a department called the Egyptian Hazardous Substances Information and Management System (EHSIMS) -- a Swiss-funded project -- three years ago.
"The project provides information on all hazardous materials used in Egypt," boasts Moussa Ibrahim, director of the EHSIMS. "Now, we have an accurate safety data sheet, a permission form, and emergency response guidelines for authorities to use."
Lack of awareness, however, remains a major challenge. Inspectors are too few for the number of economic entities and not well-trained. Safety seems low on employers priority list as evidenced by their failure to supply basic safety equipment such as gloves, masks, overalls and boots.
"But many factories don't comply with the law simply because they haven't been given guidelines," maintains Amr Abdel-Hai, an engineer at EHSIMS. Abdel-Hai's argument is based on an EHSIMS pilot project to train personnel on the safe handling of chemicals at 15 factories in the satellite cities.
"We also found that educating workers is a key-element in the enforcement of any such law," adds Abdel-Hai. "Some workers can't be bothered to wear gloves or masks, even when these are provided, because they simply don't understand that handling hazardous substances might lead to accidents necessitating that they be hospitalised -- a situation that would also cause their families to suffer."
At an auto factory, recounts Abdel- Hai, workers handling car paints were provided with a daily ration of milk to wash their bodies of the poisonous substance. "You know what they did?" he asks incredulously, "they took the milk home for their children to drink."
In light of such practices, Abdel-Hai contends that "Social insurance and awareness are crucial if the law is to be effective."
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