INGENIEUR
INGENIEUR
Improving Occupational Safety and Health in Construction
By Ir. Dr Mohd Fairuz bin Ab Rahman, Department of Occupational Safety & Health( DOSH)
The construction industry is very diverse, with large projects by big contractors on one extreme, to small projects by small contractors on the other extreme. In general, it covers businesses and workers engaged in the construction of buildings and structures. The total employment in the industry is over 1.2 million in 2015, including manual workers, skilled workers, managers, architects, engineers and various professionals, which represents around 9 % of the nation’ s workforce.
Construction remains one of the most hazardous industries, contributing about just over one-fifth( 21 %) of all fatalities to workers( 140 workers died in construction-related accidents, out of 668 work-related fatalities in 2015). More than half of the fatality cases were related with working at heights. The number of fatalities in construction only showed a slight downward trend over many years, in comparison to a more significant long-term downward trend in the number of fatalities in all industries, as shown in Figure 1. In the five years from 2011 to 2015, 495 construction workers died. This five-year average of 99 fatalities per year is about 14 % lower than the five-year average of 1999 to 2003. The construction industry has twice the mortality rate( 10.94 per 100,000 workers) to that of the average fatality rate across all industries( 4.84 per 100,000 workers).
The construction industry is very important to the country as it accounts for about 4 % of the Gross Domestic Product. With several Governmentbacked mega infrastructure construction projects in the works, the economic outlook for the industry is encouraging, as reported by the Star( Steady outlook seen for Malaysia’ s construction sector, dated June 9, 2016 and Promising 2017
30 VOL 69 JANUARY-MARCH 2017