Explorers and contractors yet to link workers’ health to sustainable growth

Industries exploring minerals and natural reserves are doing a roaring business.

The extraction, processing, manufacture and dumping of by-products sometimes occur within the same locale. Nowhere else is this more visible than along Mombasa Road.

This also happens to be the heart of the cement industry.

The greater Kitui region is also soon coming into line as the vast coal reserves start getting exploited. Elsewhere we hear of oil, iron ore exploration among other minerals in the Northern Frontier and the Coastal regions.

We are entering the “industrial age” and the scramble for mineral resources will only gather pace.

This is buoyed by the demand from our ballooning local and regional population.

However, in their quest to make good returns, many firms seem to be in a hurry and ignore occupational health hazard regulations. This isn’t only so for industries but many other employers in different spheres.

The agro sector has particularly been accused of poor handling of chemicals like pesticides and herbicides.

It is not just lack of protective clothing, but not taking care of employees’ health, long shifts complaints are also issues raised.

These affect health. Many enterprises, it seems, place a low premium on the value of an employee. More so in the Third World.

Here, employee complaints on work conditions are often downplayed. If there is anything that history teaches us, then it is that your business’ past mistakes will come to haunt you.

Our new constitutional demands already show that “big boys” can no longer be above the law, looking at what is happening at the Judiciary. What businesses could get away with a few years ago will not happen any more. Employers need to take cognizance of this fact.

Though we have laws on safeguards at the workplaces, very few institutions implement them. While attempts are made to make due note of potential harms to people, majority seem to dwell on environmental assessment. Few employers do diligent occupational health studies.

Today, we are at a point similar to the US in the early ‘70s and ‘80s where manufacturers, employers and industries made profits while turning a blind eye to workers’ plight. Decades later, the ‘80s and ‘90s were characterised by multiple class action suits against them.

Some of the verdicts resulted in winding up of businesses due to the colossal damages. A few examples were the leather, tobacco, tanning, asbestos, paint manufacturers among other “dirty” industries.