On Wednesday 26 February, the Trust’s OSH Ports Occupational Health and Safety in Ports project was recognized with the award for Learning and Engaging at the TT Club Innovation in Safety Awards hosted by the International Cargo Handing Coordination Association (ICHCA). The award was presented jointly to the ITF Seafarers’ Trust and the ITF for the OSH Ports app and accompanying Train the Trainer workshops to dockers’ unions.
The awards recognize innovation and developments in safety in the port environment, covering areas of ‘Learning and Engaging’, ‘Making Operations Safer’, ‘Segregating People & Machines’ and ‘Turning Data into Insight’. Announcing the successful innovations at a presentation ceremony in London last night, ICHCA’s CEO Richard Steele commented “As ever the judging panel felt that all the original ideas were worthy of congratulations, and further exposure. A complete Innovation in Safety Award Digest detailing all entries will therefore be once more published by ICHCA & TT in the near future.” ICHCA also commented on the increased effectiveness of advanced training and safety awareness programmes such as OSH Ports in improving port safety in recent years.
The OSH Ports project was developed in response to concerns over the frequency of accidents to workers in ports. The port environment is a particularly dangerous environment with specific hazards and risks and OSH Ports was specifically tailored for port workers, designed in coordination with sector experts and feedback from port workers themselves.
The resulting app, which is supported by the International Labour Organization’s International Training Centre (ITCILO), has been launched in the Arab World and across Latin America and the Caribbean, with the training course available in Arabic, English, Spanish and Portuguese and via Android and Apple phone apps or the dedicated website.
Katie Higginbottom, Head of the ITF Seafarers’ Trust, said “We were absolutely delighted to receive this award for our OSH Ports project from the TT Club. It’s great to have the recognition from industry professionals that they value our approach which puts unions at the centre of promoting workplace safety and health. With its user-friendly, port-specific content, the OSH Ports app aims to engage port workers covering all the fundamentals of identifying, mitigating and reporting hazards and risks. We hope it will play a significant part reducing the number of accidents and maintaining a high-level awareness of dangers in as many ports as we can reach.”
The Trust and the ITF have jointly delivered Train the trainers’ workshops across the Arab World and Latin America and the Caribbean regions with a recent re-launch of the App in Bahrain attended by over 250 dockers.
Miracle Ann King, Communications and Information Specialist at the Barbados Workers' Union (BWU) said "At the Barbados Workers' Union, Occupational Safety and Health is consistently among the top grievances we receive. We have accelerated our efforts through education and training in the Barbados Port to ensure workers and organizations understand their role in safeguarding health and safety. To receive training from the ITF and ITF ST on OSH in ports has been monumental. As a result, I’ve facilitated OSH training within the Barbados Port and across other sectors, focusing on how workers and health and safety committees can foster a strong safety culture."
As well as training in how to recognise and mitigate risks and dangers in a port, the app also focuses on how port workers can engage with health and safety initiatives in their workplace and provide feedback on risks they encounter or participate in investigations where an accident or near miss has taken place.
Steve Biggs, ITF Dockers stressed that “It’s the responsibility of ports, governments, and global operators to invest in control measures and safer equipment, but the ultimate goal of the OSH App is to increase worker participation in all aspects of health and safety in ports and reduce serious injuries and fatalities in our industry”.
More information about the app can be found on the dedicated website www.oshports.org
