Occupational Health and Safety
Creating a Safe and Secure Workplace
We have earmarked eliminating accidents and occupational injuries throughout the Mitsui Chemicals Group as one of our top priorities under our Fiscal 2012 Mid-Term Business Plan (2011-13), and are working to achieve that goal on a groupwide scale.
Occupational injuries
In fiscal 2011, we made it one of our top priorities to prevent injuries stemming from insufficient hazard prediction (KY, Kiken Yochi), and focused on safety activities at Mitsui Chemicals Works and our affiliates, revolving primarily around enhanced KY activities.
The results of our hard work during fiscal 2011 were as follows.
| Target | Fiscal 2010 | Fiscal 2011 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| DAFWCs | 0.15 or less | 0.37 | 0.28 |
| DAFWC + RWTC + MTCs | 1.8 or less | 2.3 | 2.1 |
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- The following is a general description of the categories for occupational injuries used at Mitsui Chemicals based on OSHA standards. Each individual case is examined by our company physician before determining the appropriate category. DAFWC (Days Away From Work Case) refers to occupational injuries that require at least one day of absence from work. RWTC (Restricted Work or Transfer Case) refers to occupational injuries that are not DAFWCs, in which the worker is able to return to work the following day and includes cases in which special consideration is required for the worker to return to their regular duties. MTC (Medical Treatment Case) refers to injuries that are not RWTCs in which the worker is able to return to their regular duties without special consideration.
Summary of results
We managed to reduce the frequency rate of DAFWCs from 0.37 in fiscal 2010 to 0.28 in fiscal 2011.
Although we were unable to achieve our world-leading target of 0.15 overall, we are nonetheless making steady progress and achieved outstanding results in terms of injuries involving employees and contractors at our domestic production sites, the frequency of which came in below 0.15 at 0.04.
Similarly, we managed to reduce the overall frequency of injuries (DAFWC + RWTC + MTCs) from 2.3 in fiscal 2010 to 2.1 in fiscal 2011. We have continued to make steady improvements since fiscal 2009, when the frequency stood at 2.6.
Frequency of DAFWCs (All industries/chemical industry/Mitsui Chemicals)
Frequency of occupational Injuries (Mitsui Chemicals employees + operation subcontractors)
Eliminating occupational injuries
Occupational safety at Mitsui Chemicals depends on day-to-day safety activities at each of our sites.
In the spirit of the Japan Industrial Safety & Health Association's Zero Accident Campaign, we implement safety activities based on an effective PDCA (plan, do, check, act) cycle, focusing particularly on the following three elements.
1. Philosophy, as set out by top management
2. Technique, for hazard prediction (KY, Kiken Yochi) activities, risk assessments, etc.
3. Implementation, involving all employees
We have set out the following top priorities as part of our safety activities for fiscal 2012, in accordance with our new Mid-Term Business Plan (fiscal 2012 onwards).
1. Take steps to prevent human errors
2. Prevent injuries specific to the plant type (molding, chemical process)
We intend to prevent human error first of all through hands-on training and other educational initiatives, focusing particularly on reinforcing our existing hazard prediction (KY) activities.
We intend to prevent injuries specific to the plant type through safety initiatives targeting the different plant types, focusing on “caught on or between” injuries at molding-type plants and prevention of contact with heat/chemicals at chemical process-type plants.
