Cooperation and Development Section ■ Delegation of the European Union to China and Mongolia
EU – CHINA PROJECT ON OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH & SAFETY IN HIGH RISK SECTORS
Background
China's Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) laws are reasonably well developed, but their enforcement is not effective. Occupational health in particular, has become an increasingly important issue in China. The working conditions in many medium and small-scale enterprises are poor and workers lack the necessity preventive measures against occupational diseases. The Chinese Government has been addressing these challenges through further developing laws and increased government enforcement. SAWS and a number of large Chinese companies are already moving towards a more systemic approach to risk assessment.
The EU aims to help China in the development, design and enforcement of an effective OSH strategy based on the principles of prevention and the direct involvement of workers in risk management. The EU can provide the expertise to assist China in its priorities of developing a sound risk assessment concept in the high-risk sectors and will offer assistance specifically in the sectors where SAWS has a stake. Attention will also be given to areas where leading industries display an interest in with working with China to further develop its OSH.
Project Objectives
The Project Overall Objective is to enable China to achieve effective standards of work safety and health in the high risk sectors comparable to those prevailing in the EU, including the objective of a zero-fatality rate. These high-risk sectors include: coal mining, non-coal mining and chemical industry.
The Project's Specific Objective is to develop China's capacity at all appropriate levels to design and enforce an effective OSH strategy based on the principles of prevention and the direct involvement of workers in risk management.
Estimated Project Results
The project consists of two components. The first component will address the shortcomings in institutional capacity at the central and provincial levels and will focus on aspects of policy, regulations and OSH-related standards, enforcement as well as inspection systems.
R1.1 China has put in place an encompassing and integrated OSH policy framework that is effectively enforced.
R1.2 Different Chinese government stakeholders like SAWS, Ministry of Health and Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security have developed coordinated approaches for policy formulation and strengthening of OSH.
R1.3 New policy recommendations and a systematic approach on occupational health have been developed and are being considered by the Chinese authorities for adoption and enforcement.
R1.4 A triangular dialogue between workers, employers and competent administration agencies to review and enhance the effectiveness of OSH policy, regulations and inspection systems has been put in place.
R1.5 An international dialogue network beyond the project's lifetime is established.
The second component will address the deficiencies in workers' awareness of OSH issues, in their capacity to deal with OSH demands and in enforcement of OSH regulations and standards by way of improved training, curricula, well-trained trainers, and testing at pilot worksites.
R2.1 Strengthening of the OSH skills of administration officials at both central and provincial levels.
R2.2 National training centres' curricula and trainers' skills upgraded to European standards.
R2.3. Trainers have become an integral part of the formulation and enforcement of a businesses' OSH strategy.
R2.4. Workers have taken responsibility for their own OSH in the work place.
R2.5. OSH risk awareness among inspectors, workers and managers in high-risk sectors has increased significantly.
R2.6 More effective inspection systems and follow-up.
R2.7 Results from pilot approaches at specific work sites successfully fed into training manuals and curricula for other high risk sectors, into enforcement of policies and into policy-making.
Main Project activities
These components will be achieved through implementing the following activities:
1. Exchange of expertise, best practices and solutions between EU and China
2. The organisation of workshops, seminars and conferences with a good geographical representation and participation on topics of relevance to the project content to present results and lessons learned during the project and to discuss how this can be reflected in policy making.
3. Training in the EU for (1) experienced trainers of official training centres, with a balanced geographical representation; (2) enterprise managers that have already started to implement and enforce new concepts of OSH and (3) administration inspectors
4. Developing sustainable dialogue and coordination mechanisms to enable the establishment and functioning of the triangle of employers, workers and administration that prevails beyond the projects lifetime.
Implementation Progress
The project has completed the inception phase (16 April – 31 December 2012) and preliminary phase (1 January 2013 – 28 February 2014), and it is now in its last phase of demonstration and implementation (2014 -2016). The main activities include:
- Further comparative analyses on specific areas or subjects of OSH Management
- Implementation of training courses in China
- Completing manuals and textbook for OSH trainings in China
- Trainings in the EU
- Development of an OSH communication platform
- ‘Community of practice’ of trainers (alumni group)
- Annual OSH week (seminars, workshops, etc.) events, and annual campaign
- Annual International Advisory Group meetings
- Triangular dialogue at provincial level implemented, and proposal for implementation of triangular dialogue at national level presented
Updated time of the fiche: May 2015
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