What is a risk assessment?

One of the most crucial components of ensuring that companies and employees go home each day in good health and safety is health and safety risk assessments. A risk assessment is basically a thorough investigation of potential threats to the safety of your employees. It also aids in determining what safety measures, education, and training should be put in place to lower incidents, fatalities, and injuries at work. It does take a lot of time and effort to identify hazards, but when done correctly, it can help you avoid losing employees' lives or limbs as well as time and money.

Health and Safety Representatives must physically inspect and evaluate the workplace to ascertain what is deemed to be a risk. They must also speak with employees to learn what issues are typically faced daily, but frequently, employees are uninformed of or uninterested in these repercussions.

The following guidelines should be considered:

• Whenever possible, pick a less dangerous choice (For example, choose a less hazardous chemical over the one you may currently be using)
• By implementing safety measures, prevent access to potential dangers.
• Rearrange the workspace to reduce risk of exposure.
• To ensure that people are wearing the appropriate PPE to their jobs, issue PPE and establish stringent guidelines.
• Ensure that employees are equipped and trained for emergency scenarios.

Whether a proper risk assessment has been carried out by a qualified individual in your workplace is one of the first questions an inspector from the Department of Employment and Labour would ask. The SHE Risk Assessment you provide to the inspector should include a list of any potential risks for accidents or incidents that could harm employees' or the workplace's productivity, as well as the control measures you already have in place as well as those that still need to be put in place.

Inspectors from the Department of Employment and Labour will not put up with any non-compliance, and if something goes wrong as a result, there could be severe repercussions, including R50,000 in fines and a year in jail for employees and R100,000 in fines and two years in jail for companies. It's crucial to keep in mind that if they feel the employment is unsafe, employees have the freedom to decline it.

Risk Assessment in the Workplace

The following laws and regulations are in place in the interest of employees across industries in South Africa:

• The Occupational Health and Safety Act (OSHA)
• The Mine Health and Safety Act (MHSA)
• The Compensation for Occupational Injuries and Diseases Act (COIDA)
• The Occupational Diseases in Mines and Works Act (ODMWA)
• The Basic Conditions of Employment Act (BCEA)
• The Labour Relations Act (LRA)

Every employer is required to create and maintain a workplace that is risk-free for the health and safety of employees under the South African Occupational Health and Safety Act, 85 of 1993 (OHSA). Simply put, an occupational health and safety risk assessment is a close examination of potential hazards for workplace injuries. Additionally, it aids businesses in deciding what safety measures, education, and expertise must be implemented to prevent workplace fatalities, injuries, and accidents.

Annual risk assessments are required, but they may be completed earlier if

• There has been an event, in which case it must be repeated to identify the contributing factors.
• The work environment has undergone substantial changes, particularly when it comes to the need to include new and distinct hazards to the risk assessment.