Samuel Laryea
School of Construction Management and Engineering, University of Reading, P.O. Box 219, Reading, RG6 6AW, UK
s.laryea@reading.ac.uk
Sarfo Mensah
Department of Building Technology, Kumasi Polytechnic, P. O. Box 854, Kumasi, Ghana
sarfmen@yahoo.com
The state of health and safety on construction sites in Ghana was investigated using first hand observation of fourteen (14) construction project sites in 2009 and 2010. At each site, the construction project, workers and the physical environment of the site were inspected and evaluated against health and safety indicators taken from the literature. The results reveal a poor state of health and safety on Ghanaian construction sites. The primary reasons are a lack of strong institutional framework for governing construction activities and poor enforcement of health and safety policies and procedures. Also, Ghanaian society does not place a high premium on health and safety of construction workers on site. Interviews with workers indicated that injuries and accidents are common on sites. However, compensation for injury is often at the discretion of the contractor although collective bargaining agreements between Labour unions and employers prescribe obligations for the contractor in the event of injury to a worker.
Keywords: construction site, contractor, Ghana, health and safety.
About Me
- Samuel Laryea
- Johannesburg, Guateng, South Africa
- I am a Senior Lecturer in the School of Construction Economics and Management at University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa. In the past, I have been a Lecturer in the School of Construction Management and Engineering at the University of Reading, UK (2010-12); and also a Post-Doctoral Academic Fellow (2009) and Graduate Teaching Assistant (2008). I completed my PhD at University of Reading in Dec 2008 on the relationship between risk and price in tendering. Prior to transferring to Reading in Jan 2008, I was an MPhil/PhD student at KNUST, Ghana (2004-07). I gained my undergraduate degree in Building Technology from Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), Ghana in 1998-2002. During school days, my peers elected me to serve in several leadership positions including SRC President at KNUST. From 1994-96, I attended Suhum Sec. Tech. School after basic education at schools in Ghana and Nigeria. I did my National Service with the Fanteakwa District Assembly in 2002-03. After that, I worked at the Development Office of KNUST until I started my PhD in 2004. I am a co-organiser for the WABER Conference and an author of 30+ research publications.
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2 comments:
Safety and health is very important for every worker. I'm sure no one wants to encounter accidents. So we must follow rules for safety, and using or wearing safety gear like fall arrest must be implemented for every construction site.
Health and safety of the workers is the main concern on construction sites. Many sites fail to pass the safety standards when it is being inspected by local authorities. Well, it doesn’t mean that they’ll lose their work. What authorities aim to do is to change the workers’ way of working. They must be aware how dangerous their job is, so they should protect themselves from any possible risk.
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