By Bimbola Oyesola
The International Labour Organisation (ILO) has urged Micro, medium and small-scale enterprises (MSMEs) in Nigeria to adopt safety and health in the workplace.
Speaking at a one-day workshop in Lagos on the theme “Strengthening the Capacity of Local MSMEs/Manufacturers to Produce High Quality PPEs and Healthcare-related Products”, the director-general of the Lagos State Safety Commission, Mr. Lanre Mojola, said the workshop was aimed to strengthen local capacities of MSMEs in terms of occupational safety and health.
Mojola said from observation they have found out that a lot of MSMEs do not put safety first in the discharge of their activities and as a result of this there has been a lot of occurrences of incidents of injuries due to lack of safety practices.
“This workshop basically is an initiative of the ILO and supported by the Ministry of Labour and Employment and other safety organisations on how safety can be deepen across the sector” he stated.
He revealed that the workshop was an improvement on the online detailed train the trainer section that went through the cogent safety areas, premises safety, materials storage and machine safety in terms of usage and welfare to the staff and working environment in control of substances hazardous to health and control of COVID-19 and the host of others.
He averred that the whole point was to ensure that they enlighten the owners of buildings of MSMEs to understand the importance of safety, as this has been what they are doing and will continue to develop local ability and capability so that they will be brought up to speed in terms of operational safety and practice.
Reacting to building collapse in Lagos state, he said there are several factors asides from the substandard products.
He reiterated that there is also a problem of lack of clear direction of duties, where one person is the master of all, which is an aberration.
He lamented that there is also an issue of people trying to maximize profit particularly regarding structure component.
Mojola reassured that they will continue to carry out sentization and advocacy programmes regarding development and also work with sisters agency that are directly in charge of building.
He asserted that when there is building collapse there are laws that are already promulgated and defaulters are made to face the full warrant of the law
The International Labour (ILO) representative, Ms Chineye Anekwe said the workshop was a COVID response project that is funded by the United Nation basket and jointly implemented by ILO, UNIDO and WHO.
She said the aim of the workshop was to improve the capacity of local MSMEs and manufacturers to adopt to new competitive market circumstances in order to ensure safety and health at work and access business developments and financial services.
“The whole essence is to bring to light the consciousness of occupational safety and also enforce it in the mind of MSMEs and celebrate what they have learnt from the online training” she said.