Assessing Educational Needs of Workers on Effective Health, Safety, Environment and Quality (HSEQ) Management System in Ghana's Oil Retail Industry
Date
2014
Authors
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Journal ISSN
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Publisher
European Journal of Business and Management
Abstract
The study examined the knowledge of workers in ten Ghanaian indigenous and multinational oil marketing
companies and assessed educational needs of workers to understand how the implementation of the Health,
Safety, Environment and Quality (HSEQ) Management System would help in promoting health, safety,
environment and quality culture in Ghana’s oil retail industry. A semi-structured interview for management staff,
managers, dealers as well as forecourt attendants of retail sites was used. The study revealed that, multinational
oil marketing companies implemented HSEQ management systems in their quest to strengthen the safety culture
of their companies whereas the indigenous oil companies saw implementation of such HSEQ management
system as an additional overhead cost. Moreover, their approaches to achieve safety culture were deficient and
failed to embrace holistic approach relying on interventions that lacked effective communication between major
partners and stakeholders. The need for companies to formally communicate a procedure for the management of
workers compensation claims to all employees prior to engagement and provide HSEQ training programme for supervisory personnel, educating subcontractors about HSEQ policies and procedures was expressed. Educational needs were also expressed for skills to investigate HSEQ incidents and ability to write reports and
develop written action plans for prevention of similar incidents in future.