The Cosira Group reports one-million injury-free hours

                         -          Absolute safety requires absolute commitment

The Cosira Group, one of southern Africa’s largest steel fabrication and construction companies, has reported one-million injury-free hours, highlighting the centricity of the group’s zero harm policy.

“Our safety and zero harm policies are in line with best practice and world-class standards, ensuring not only peace of mind for the Cosira Group, but most importantly – for its clients,” says Grant Bishop, the Cosira Group’s safety, health and environment (SHE) manager.

Safety and zero harm form the foundation of all the Cosira Group’s operations. The company has for some time now, completely embraced the goal of zero harm, which encompasses health, environmental issues and safety. But the Cosira Group strives to go beyond merely complying with regulations and more towards an entire mindset change. “Cosira’s Zero Harm approach is promoted top-down and bottom-up, throughout the company and where possible safer practices are continuously adopted,” says Bishop.

Bishop, who oversees safety standards from the bidding stages and ensures that Cosira meets the SHE standards for each and every project for which the group tenders, explains that numerous plans and strategies are drawn up and implemented to achieve injury-free milestones. These range from establishing risk assessments for clients, as well as following a Behaviour-Based Safety plan.  Furthermore, the company is ISO 9001:2008 accredited; and has completed the first stage SHE integrated audits for ISO 14001 and OSHAS 18001, with certification, planned for October 2010.

When it comes to health and safety, there has been a positive shift, in the local and global construction industry, not only towards the health and safety of employees, but also towards quality management and environmental best practices. The Cosira Group is at the forefront of this global shift, having recognised the importance of having a dedicated, full-time safety representatives present on site at all times. The safety team provides a consistent presence and maintains focus on pertinent issues within the company. “We are committed to our customers’ needs, and offer dynamic, flexible construction solutions through our people, processes and products. With safety and a safety and zero harm culture playing an integral part of our daily lives, we live our passion through our products and services,” says Bishop.

According to Bishop, the most common SHE risks faced by the steel fabrication industry include both Safety and Health risks:

Safety Risks:

• Explosions which can be caused by the types of gasses required during the fabrication process
• Material handling, from simple I-beams to complex chutes
• Nip points which are frequent hazards in fabrication, caused by the rotating parts on machinery
• Manhandling of material
• Power tools used on fabrication plants
• Moving machinery around the fabrication plant

Health Risks:

• Exposure to high levels of noise, sometimes in excess of 90 decibels
• Welders are often exposed to welding fumes and repetitive work

Says Bishop: “The Occupational Health and Safety Act, Act 85 of 1993 regulates and clearly sets out the minimum requirements we have to adhere to in all of our fabrication plants, but we have made it a group policy to go beyond the compliance of minimum standards. At Cosira, we have also incorporated other legislation and requirements: including: the Mines Health and Safety Act, Environmental law, International Legislation - ISO and OHSAS standards, as well as client requirements and best international practices to ensure that we can implement and maintain Safety, Health and Environment compliance of the absolute highest standards.”

Bishop adds that detailed risk assessments and method statements ensure compliance with client SHE requirements. “For instance, in mining operations, the client will have existing strategies to counteract risk, hazards and challenges in the work environment. The Cosira Group follows these closely, sharing our own best practice policies with the client. During the course of the project, we hand over monthly reports to our client, measuring our performance in terms of safety,” says Bishop.

One of Cosira’s most important safety principles is Behaviour-Based Safety (BBS) and encompasses a systemic change in attitude that keeps safety at the forefront of every member of staff's mind. “In this way, safe work practices become a lifestyle, and a reflex that is so entrenched that it becomes normal work practice,” says Bishop.

This is echoed by John da Silva, CEO of the Cosira Group: “Absolute safety requires absolute commitment, and with that in mind, the Cosira Group has actively put strategies in place to ensure that, throughout the company, our culture embraces an awareness of the safety for our staff; as well as maintaining a ‘zero harm’ policy towards the environment at all times.”

According to Bishop, the single greatest challenge that a steel fabrication company faces in addressing risks and adhering to world-class best practices is in obtaining absolute buy-in from employees in the steel fabrication plant. “Many people find it challenging to immediately embrace change,” says Bishop, “Which is why we have implemented a number of processes to facilitate this development within the company. The other challenge is ensuring that the correct health and safety measures have been implemented, and that these measures are achieving what they were initially intended for.”

Not only does Cosira have full-time safety officers in all its manufacturing facilities, but the SHE Management system and plan at Cosira is revised annually, and takes into account both clients’ requirements and the industry standards. Risk assessments are also made and adapted to each client’s project SHE guidelines and requirements.

Bishop goes on to explain that Cosira’s zero harm policy has involved a great deal of time, planning and revision before becoming what it is today. “Fortunately, we were able to recognise that the conventional SHE Management System was no longer working for us, and that we needed to implement some changes,” says Bishop. “This lead to the implementation of the the KISS (Keep It Sweet and Simple) principle. In other words - back to the basics.”

According to Bishop, instead of getting bogged down by SHE initiatives and strategies, we revised our entire SHE Management system from our SHE Policy right down.

 

The following actions were taken:

• Risk Assessments were conducted throughout the group’s operations
• Management Programs where raised for high risk areas of operation
• Additional control measures were identified and implemented until the residual risk became acceptable
• Process flows where revisited and all associated tasks relisted.
• Safe Operating Procedures where revised or drafted as per process flow
• All employees were retrained accordingly
• The Cosira Group furthermore revisited and revised all of its induction programs and other training initiatives to ensure that these were completely relevant to all of its operations.

The results speak for themselves – the Cosira Group has achieved its first milestone of a Million Man-hours without a Loss Time Injury and is now working towards achieving Two Million Man-hours without a Loss Time Injury. 

In addition to the Behaviour-Based Safety (BBS) previously mentioned, the Cosira is in the process of investigating the implementation of People-Based Safety (PBS) - a concept developed around observing people’s interactions and styles of operating in the workplace, identifying individual responses in reacting to hazards in the work environment. “The idea is that people are taught to be self-aware and change their behaviour from an individualised perspective,” notes Bishop.

“PBS is an innovative new approach to safety that goes beyond behaviour-based safety, to focus on human thoughts and attitudes to promote safe behaviour. This involves transforming the way employees conceptualise how they work, and helps them approach each task in a safer manner. It makes them more aware of the dangers associated with their work and the best way to approach them,” says Bishop.

Quality Management in construction is becoming as critical as the principles of Health Safety and Environment, and furthermore, South Africa has for a while now been at the centre of an industry wide-shift which seeks new opportunities to use quality management throughout the various development stages of construction projects.

According to Bishop the Cosira Group has for many years recognised the importance of a rigorous Quality Management System (QMS) to complement its stringent and consistent health and safety standards and also employs a full-time Quality Assurance manager to ensure that the highest international standards are maintained in this regard. “We believe that our stringent quality control system gives the Cosira Group the competitive advantage during the tendering process,” adds da Silva.

Furthermore, the Cosira Group’s ultimate target is to be totally injury-free, with the SHE team aiming to become industry leaders by applying best practices and procedures.

“As the SHE team, we monitor the various sections to ensure compliance with every aspect from safety induction procedures, to the wearing of safety gear, factory layout and set-up, as well as fire equipment compliance and guidelines,” says Bishop. “Our safety and zero harm philosophy is, and will remain, a critical part of how we do business.”

“Not only is it crucial that the Group complies with quality, safety, health and environmental standards, it is also an investment – especially with regards to the BBS and PBS strategies in our factories, and our clients’ working environments.  The Cosira Group is proud to be dedicated and committed to a ‘Home – Work – Play - Zero Tolerance, Zero Harm – Way of Life’ philosophy,” concludes da Silva