By Afedzi Abdullah, GNA
Cape Coast, Oct. 8, GNA – Ghana will host the
first edition of the Africa Conference on Occupational Health and Safety (OHS)
from Monday October 29 to Wednesday October 31, 2018 in Accra.
The conference which would be hosted by the
Ministry of Employment and Labour Relations with technical partnership from
Occupational Health and Safety for Africa (OHSA) aims at bringing together key
stakeholders in occupational health and safety to share experiences, research
and offer solutions related to work in the African setting.
The conference would be held under the theme
“Safe and Healthy Work Culture for Sustainable Development “with participants
from Nigeria, South Africa, Egypt, Cote D’Ivoire and other African countries as
well as Europe.
It would be opened by the President, Nana Addo
Dankwah Akuffo-Addo and chaired by the Okyenhene, Osagyefuo Nana Amoatia Ofori
Panin.
Speakers at the conference would include Mr
Ignatius Baffour-Awuah, Minister of Employment and Labour Relations, Linda
Reinstein, President of Asbestos Disease Awareness Organisation (ADAO), USA, Mr
Amed Bamba, ISSA Liaison Officer for West Africa, Mr Alan Stevens, Head of
Global Engagement and Partnerships, IOSH, UK.
The rest are Mr Dennis Zulu, Country Director,
ILO, Dr Dennis Addo, Founder and CEO of Claron Health International, Mr Elhi
Iden, CEO, Occupational Health and Safety Managers, Nigeria, Mr Paul Kuunang,
CEO, Sheq Solutions,Dr Hanan Mohammed, Dibrugah University, India and Dr Hugo
Schmidt, Lab Manager, University of Cambridge, Singapore among others.
It would have in attendance, authorities in
charge of Labour and Employment in the Region, labour experts, health, safety
and environment experts and international, inter-regional and local
organisations whose work relate to the corresponding fields.
A key feature of the conference would be the
National Launch of Vision Zero Campaign which is a global campaign, launched by
the International Social Security Association (ISSA) in Singapore at the XXI
World Safety and Health Congress in 2017 with the Africa launch in Cote
D’Ivoire in April 2018.
Ghana would become the third African country
after Cote D’Ivoire and Nigeria to launch this global campaign that has seen
over 1950 companies and trainers sign up.
Ms Emilly Akumah, a Technical Advisor to the
OSH Africa Secretariat in an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA) said
the conference would be organised to provide a forum to examine the latest
trends in OSH and also to promote health, Safety and well-being in Ghana and
Africa.
She said there would be industry specific
Technical Sessions to discuss OSH issues specific to different sectors,
National OSH Dialogues, Exhibitions on Health, Safety, Well-being and Security
and Technical visits to good practice enterprises.
This, according to her, would provide useful
insight into good occupational health practices in Ghana and the whole of
Africa.
The conference would be a very important milestone
in bridging gaps between rapidly changing world of work in Africa and the
corresponding challenges versus solutions in bringing about a healthy balance.
She said while Ghana and other African
countries were turning onto the path of industrialisation, there was the need
for an OSH document to guarantee the safety of people who would work in the
industries adding that, is one of the key issues that should have been
addressed before industrialising.
“If you want to industrialise, you need to
have a culture where people pay attention to safe working environment and
before that can happen, we need the right structures at the regulatory level
before it even translate to industries” she added
GNA