Displaying items by tag: Safety

Nicaragua: Cemex Nicaragua, has been awarded a national prize as a leading business for its industrial safety management procedures. The award was given by the National Council for Work Safety and Hygiene and refers to the firm's Canal plant in southwest Managua. The firm is building a new production unit in the northeast section of the same city at the moment. This new unit is due to begin operations early in 2015.

United Arab Emirates: Turkish cement producer Adana Cement has won an award for safety performance improvement at the 11th Annual DuPont Safety and Sustainability Awards, which took place in Dubai on 24 September 2013. Six award recipients were selected by an independent jury comprised of leading experts in occupational safety and sustainability.

Adana Cement was chosen for its efforts to create a safe work environment. In 2005 the company established an integrated OHSAS 18001-certified Safety Management System, before implementing further processes and improvements in 2008 after recognition that 96% of accidents were caused by dangerous behaviour, rather than conditions.

Together, these initiatives have had a profound effect in shaping a positive safety culture among employees. In particular, a multi-faceted approach, including behaviour-oriented site visits, accident information meetings, reward and sanction practices and a schedule of continuous training programmes, has resulted in a dramatic decrease in employee and sub-contractor accidents since 2008, based on statistics collected since 2003. A new record of 243 uninterrupted days without an accident was achieved in 2012, in a period when expanding production objectives were successfully met.

Pakistan: A memorandum of understanding (MoU) has been signed between Lafarge Pakistan Ltd and the All Pakistan Cement Manufacturers Association (APCMA) for provision of health and safety training and awareness to all its members. Amr Reda, CEO of Lafarge Pakistan observed, "The cement industry operates in an environment with multiple types of hazards, making it our priority to ensure the safety of all people, working directly and indirectly, in it."

The APCMA welcomed the initiative and is encouraging all of its members to not only study and apply these safety standards and take the initiative to share the best practices across their organisations. Aizaz Sheikh, CEO of Kohat Cement and Chairman of APCMA stated, "APCMA is thankful to Lafarge Pakistan for coming forward with the idea and are happy to embrace this initiative. The proposal was unanimously approved by the council and the APCMA looks forward to further initiatives under this MoU".

Amr Reda expressed his delight on the APCMA agreement, saying, "We are happy to share our learning and best practices with other companies through the platform of the APCMA. As part of our long-term commitment to health and safety, Lafarge Pakistan will continue to impart knowledge and awareness on this subject to other industrial establishments in Pakistan."

US: Holcim (US) has announced that its Devil's Slide facility in Morgan, Utah, has completed eight years without a lost time injury (LTI). "We congratulate the employees of our Devil's Slide facility for their accomplishment and untiring attention to safety," said Bernard Terver, president and chief executive officer of Holcim (US) Inc. "Our employees have shown great commitment to implementing our universal safety measures. We're proud of what they have accomplished and look forward to continued excellence."

UK: Lafarge UK is celebrating the achievement of one of its UK cement production sites, which has reached the milestone of 10 years without a lost-time injury (LTI). Workers at the Cookstown Works in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland, have not suffered any injury that prevents an employee or contractor returning to work the next day since 2002.

Thanks to a strong team commitment to safety, the achievement has put Cookstown Works in the Lafarge Group's record books. Of the company's 170 cement production sites across the world, this is the longest any site has gone without a LTI.

Commenting on the major achievement, Cookstown Works manager William McGuckne said, "This is a proud moment for the team. Through continued hard work and constant vigilance on safety in all aspects of our operation, we have managed to maintain our safety performance and achieve this fantastic record. A culture of assessing risks, proceeding with care and looking out for each other has helped us contribute to the Lafarge Group's ultimate goal of zero harm to any of our employees or contractors."

Lafarge UK president Dyfrig James added, "My congratulations go to the whole Cookstown Works team of employees and contractors for achieving this world first for Lafarge's cement business."