Worksite safety in the spotlight

MANAMA: More than 800 delegates are taking part in a high-level meeting in Bahrain to discuss safety, occupational health and promoting safe working conditions in the Gulf countries.

They are taking part in the 10th Professional Development Conference and Exhibition that kicked off last night at the Gulf Hotel's Gulf International Convention and Exhibition Centre at.

The conference organised by the American Society of Safety Engineers-Middle East Chapter (ASSE-MEC) is being held under the patronage of Interior Minister Shaikh Rashid bin Abdulla Al Khalifa, who attended the opening ceremony last night.

He honored companies including Bapco, GPIC, Kuwait National Petroleum Company, Saudi Aramco and other firms.

Representatives of companies and consultants in oil, gas, petrochemical and other industries, regionally and globally, are taking part in the forum that will continue until Wednesday.

It is being held under the theme "Your Safety is our Business, Your Future is our Mission" , and is aimed to provide and exchange information on anticipating, evaluating and controlling hazards in the work place.

In his opening remarks ASSE-MEC president Abdulaziz Al Ghamdi said the society is the world's oldest and largest professional safety organisation.

He said it has 34,000 members and they manage, supervise and consult on safety, health and environmental issues in industry, insurance, government and education.

"In the Middle East we have 350 safety experts regionally and since 1982 have conducted series of meetings in Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the UAE."

International and local experts from Pakistan, the UK, Australia and the Gulf countries will participate in close to 60 technical sessions.

Some of them will be dedicated to safety, health and environment, transportation safety, waste management, fire protection, emergency response planning, pollution control and security risk assessment.

The pressing need to promote a safety culture among the increasing workforce in GCC countries was raised in the keynote speech by Saudi Arabian Oil Company executive director for safety and industrial security Mohammad Al Zahrani. "We need to address safety issues for workforce from diverse backgrounds in addition to working on challenges of road traffic safety."

He said they were adopting "4Es" strategy that focused on engineering, education, enforcement and emergency response.

Source : www.Gulf-Daily-News.com