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Write report of strategies that your industry or sector uses to protect the safety and health and of its work force.
According to Albert et al, occupational health and safety of the workers in the supermarket depend upon industrial safety, hygiene and psychological factors. For the past few decades, supermarkets industry have been providing crucial services to the general public and has proved itself to be a significant source of employment around the world. All these years, the concerted efforts on the part of store managers and employees have resulted very few occupational injuries and illnesses (Sesé et al., 2002). However, even after these precautions, thousands of supermarket workers still get injured on the job each year. The injuries that these workers normally suffer from are repetitive strain injury and other work related disorders. A lot of grocery stores undertook some steps in order to reduce exposures to the ergonomic risk factors intended to attenuate workplace injuries. As a matter of truth, the grocery store workers take care of thousands of items daily to stock shelves, check groceries, decorating bakery items as well as preparing meat products and as a result certain ergonomic risk factors arise regarding to their postures. These disorders are collectively known as Musculoskeletal Disorders (MSDs) that comprise various injuries and illnesses such as strain and injuries in muscles and back occurring out of repeated use of overexertion, tendinitis, Carpal tunnel syndrome, Rotator cuff injuries of shoulder, Epicondylitis problem related to elbow and trigger finger occurring out of more and more use of single finger.
According to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) recommendations, there are a number of workplace ergonomics and safety programs being developed by the management of grocery stores. These programs have been initiated with an intent of providing flexibility framework that a grocery store manager can adapt to each individual store. As per OSHA recommendations, employees need to develop processes for systematically addressing musculoskeletal issues in their facilities (Chao and Henshaw, 2004). Therefore, these processes are incorporated to reinforce overall programs in order to recognize and prevent occupational safety and health hazards. These programs can be summarized in the following strategies:
Providing management support:
The support from the management enhances the groceries store’s ability to maintain a sustained effort, resource allocation as well as following program implementation.
Involving employees:
Employees, generally, are a crucial source of information regarding safety hazards in the workplace as they help in identifying and solving problems. These efforts involve submitting suggestions and concerns; discussing work methods; responding to surveys and questionnaires; participation in task groups with the responsibility for ergonomics.
Identifying problems and implement solutions:
It is really vital to have a periodic review on the part of managers to their job site and the activities of the employees to identify potential ergonomic issues.
Provide training:
Training is very critical aspect as far as safety issues in the supermarkets are concerned. These training information include knowledge of the work that lead to pain or injury and understanding proper tools and work practices.
Chao, E. and Henshaw, J. (2004). Guidelines for Retail Grocery Stores. [online] Available at: https://www.osha.gov/Publications/osha3192.pdf [Accessed 11 Mar. 2016].
Sesé, A., Palmer, A., Cajal, B., Montaño, J., Jiménez, R. and Llorens, N. (2002). Occupational safety and health in Spain. Journal of Safety Research, 33(4), pp.511-525.