Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Saving life with 12 rules


1) Sorry for taking long time to write blog. I am too busy with work during my previous job in electronic company before this. Now I have start with fresh spirit, certainly with new company which is more chalenging yet interesting enough that makes me hunger for more knowledge. I will tell later where I am and with whom I worked but now, let us see this good concept by SHELL HSE bringing 12 Life Saving Rules into action. It has effectively started on 1st July 2009 and has been cascaded through organization and contractors organization.
2) The blue symbol represent mandatory compliance. If found breach of rules, the employee or company or contractor will be banned from entering site. For the red symbol represent prohibition. This concept has also being embedded in Orientation and Induction Training to stress out the importance of compliance on 12 areas mentioned in the picture.
3) Please check symbol no. 6. The symbol explanation is to wear safety harness when working at height at 1.8 meter and above. Yes, 1.8 meter and above, much more stricter than current National Standard at 2.0 meter.
4) Look at symbol No. 8. You can see the prohibition of smoking but not all areas inside the premise are prohibited to smoke but actually there are designated areas for smoking inside Oil and Gas premise which has been assessed from safety perspective.
5) For symbol no.3 , verify isolation before work begin with the use of LOTO. LOTO stands for Lock Out Tag Out or some organization called it Lock, Tag and Try. Just I am not sure specifically life protecting equipment refers to what? Is it PPE (Personal Protective Equipment)? I'll find out later.
6) Confine space and gas test are like "pepatah melayu ; Bagai aur dengan tebing ". Haha. I don't know how it should be translated in English. Maybe " Like the River and The Bank, Cannot Be Separated " Haha. Ok..back to our main discussion. Confine Space is very critical area that it should not be taken lightly. Many lives has been the victims of confine space whether suffocation, poisoned, asphyxiation and some of the story involved explosion in confine space. Therefore, confine space training should be given to the employee. NIOSH malaysia offered AESP (Authorised Entrant and Standby Person) competency training for work involving confine space. I will elaborate more details on Confine Space in my future post.
7) This is good concept to address to all workers and should be explained in daily toolbox meeting in local language to make sure the general workers undertand what is the 12 Life Saving Rules.

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

MSc in OSH Management UUM BAGUS !


Salam and Good day,


I have graduated from Universiti Utara Malaysia last October. I took Master in Occupational Safety and Health Management. It is a joint venture between NIOSH and UUM. Quite encouraging, the course just started about 3 years ago and finally it have been recognized by Department of Safety and Health after long hard efforts by Profesor Mohd Khan. We do remember Prof was a father-type approach to the students. Thank you so much and not forget to all the lecturers involved. I as an ex-student of Masters in Occupational Safety and Health Management reccomended this course to whom wanting to further study. 5 stars !!!!
Regards,
Salihin

Monday, February 23, 2009

WHAT CRISIS HAS DONE SO FAR

Salam and good day

Nowaday, the crisis has rear its ugly head. In 1997, the crisis just hit in Asia Pacific alone, so the impact is not as bad as this time. This time the crisis hits worldwide and all private company workers are panic. Unemployement rates becomes soaring high and Economist expected it will take 5 years or more to recover. WOW! so long time brother.

What the impact on Safety and Health Practitioner in Malaysia ?. Even though the big impact is more on manufacturing sector (electronic, semiconductor and several other manufacturers non comodity), other sector such Oil and gas sector, shipping and etc are also felt the hit as a result of chain effect. Manufacturing sector nowadays are controlling or freezing OT. Stopping the recruitment to reduce overhead cost. Kesian to new graduate in our field where finding the job will not make an easy way in manufacturing sector.

For me, I felt the pressure where company cut cost until 30% compare to last fiscal year budget. How to implement occupational safety and health programs ? Give me a headache...But i finally make a decision to focus only to the important things, ZERO MAJOR ACCIDENT. I try to minimize to only the programs that give the impacts. Safety Patrol Audit and You See You Act programs are a must.

See below what the economy crisis has done so far : -

INFORMATION FROM PERBADANAN KEMAJUAN N.MELAKA (AS 5/2/2009)
IN MONTHLY INDUSTRY MEETING


1.Likom - Sent back 50 foreign workers

2.Koa Denko - Working 4 days

3. Ohara - Retrenched 300

4. Maxell - Send back foreign workers

5. Swanment - Reduce OT, plan to retrench

6. Kenny - Business still stable

7. Ornasteel - Slow order

8. TKR - Slow order

9. Panasonic (Semi-cond) - OK

10. Panasonic (Foundry) - Reduce OT

11. Panasonic (Pedma) - Close by 27/2/08, downsize business, from 3 plants to 1 plant only

12. MFS - Reduce OT, sent back 70 foreigners

13. Omega - 70 local employees on VSS. Sent back 550 foreigners. 10% salary cut for certain level. Total employees only left 700 out of 1300

14. Dominant - 25 local employees on VSS. Sent back 200 foreigners

15. Infineon - 59 local employees on VSS. No OT. Many staff resigned due to no overtime. 15% salary cut for director and above.

16. TEAC - Business slow, reduce OT and 14 local employees on retirement plan

17. Honda - OK but aggressively implementing cost down programme

18. Vishay - 100 local employees on VSS (above 50 years)

19. CTRM - OK

20. Majusteel - Reduce OT

21. Possehl - Only working for 2 days (office), 3 days (prod). 100 – VSS. Mac another VSS

LATEST UPDATE IN MALAYSIA. OTHER INFO

1. V.S. Industry Berhad – 1st quarter net profit falls almost 60%. 2 of the factories are facing critical downturn.

2. Flextronics – Has shut down 4 weeks (2 consecutive weeks for last Christmas/09 New Year and this CNY) and expected to resume work only next Monday.

3. Venture – Kempas plant is down to 4-day work per week while Tebrau has retrenched major contract workers and FULLY freeze OT. Either Venture or Flextronics is speculated to cease operation soon following a Taiwanese company named Foxcon would most probably take over HP business project from them.

4. Celestica – down to 4-day work per week.

5. Beyonics – down to 4-day work per week.

6. Seagate – 3 US based VP/Directors had been fired. Top management and executive level staff cut pay 10-15%.

7. Qimonda – Germany HQ is reported to apply bankruptcy following Germany government failed to provide financial support. If such happened, means Senai plant will be closed as well. Feb – Apr will be the critical period. Melaka

8. Panasonic to close 27 plants world wide and retrench 15,000 employees – Melaka plant to be shut down in March. http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2009/2/6/business/3205889&sec=business Penang

9. Spansion - CEO quits, chip maker seeks buyer http://www.networkworld.com/news/2009/020309-spansion-ceo-quits-chip-maker.html

10. NEC (Prai) – work 4-day week

11. Intel to close 2 plants in Penang Island this year and shift workers to Kulim plant

12. Molex - http://sg.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20090128/tbs-molex-7318940.html

13. Agilent - pay cut 10% 14. Fairchild – work 4-days week 15. Avago – job cut about 100 ppl in December 2008 16. Molex – Chinese New Year shut down for 2 weeks World Wide http://4.jfserver.info/community/retrenchment/retrenchment_full.php?sort=firmtitle&order=desc

Saturday, February 21, 2009

CREATING MY FIRST OSH BLOG

I am relieved that my wish to create a blog of my own experience in OSH finally came true at H 18:14 on 21 Feb 2009. This blog may serve as a guide to young OSH out there if they are interested to become SHO practitioner and I will sometime also share some health tips in this blogs.