Enhancing Health & Safety in Manufacturing: Proven Strategies for a Secure Workforce

Sustainability means working in ways that can be kept up long-term. A vital part of that is not destroying the natural environment. But it also means social responsibility - and that means taking care of the health and safety of workers.

Ultimately, if you don’t have a safe operation, it is not a sustainable operation.  

Across the EU there were 500 fatal accidents in manufacturing in 2018, and a further 594,000 non-fatal accidents which led to at least four days’ absence from work.

Effective and controlled maintenance and operation of machines is key to safety - as highlighted in our new report exploring sustainability challenges in manufacturing.

So, how to cut accident rates? One key focus, as the report points out, should be the interaction between people and machines. The more remote analysis and inspection can be performed and the fewer direct machine interactions there are, the lower the accident rate will be.

Minimizing the number of times someone needs to be near a machine is crucial – any inspection or maintenance intervention is potentially dangerous.

Modern industrial analytics solutions facilitate remote monitoring, inspection and diagnostics with dramatic effect. Some manufacturers have reduced the need for manual inspections by over 50% - increasing operational efficiency whilst significantly improving safety.

The report and video also offer advice on:

• Safer, faster maintenance based on data rather than gut feelings
• Predictive maintenance to cut the number of times engineers have to change components
• Methods leveraging Industry 4.0 analytics to reduce the risks of catastrophic machine failure

 For the full report, click here. For a video on how the use of Industry 4.0 keeps employees safe, click here.