As part of SCA’s ongoing mission to foster a safety-first culture, the global hygiene and forest products company will be launching its first-ever global Safety Week.
Between September 29 and October 6, SCA will strengthen its safety credentials and promote industry best practice through a week of innovative on-site training, safety workshops and community engagement initiatives.
In line with the company’s year-on-year improvements of workplace safety, the global initiative is said to help drive SCA’s vision of reducing workplace accidents to zero while firmly entrenching health and safety as a core company value.
To help spread this message, SCA’s UK manufacturing sites will be sharing their safety success stories with their local communities through a range of educational safety initiatives.
These include providing local schools with high-visibility vests to help keep children safe on school trips and a tree-planting day, where school children will learn first-hand about safety from SCA employees.
Colin Popplewell, site manager at the SCA Manchester mill and manager responsible for driving safety in the UK’s manufacturing sites, commented: “The safety industry needs to become more proactive, rather than just reactive, which is why I am thrilled to be working for a company where health and safety programmes and initiatives are an integrated part of the business.
“We know that safety at work not only affects employees, but also those closest to them. It takes a significant amount of time and effort to establish new health and safety procedures and in particular, encourage long-term and positive behavioural change.
“But at SCA we are excited to embrace the challenge of further improving standards for our workforce in an innovative and exciting way with our very first Safety Week.”
In 2014, 20 SCA manufacturing sites in 13 different countries recorded zero workplace accidents, including two UK facilities.
The company is now working to reduce the number of workplace accidents globally, hitting its initial target of reducing the accident frequency rate by 25% between 2011 and 2016 ahead of schedule in 2014.
Safety Week will be followed up by the formulation and implementation of safety-improvement action plans at each site to ensure all SCA’s employees’ safety.
