Industrialization and public health (Indian perspective).pdf
HEALTH AND SAFETY IN NIGERIAN EXTRACTIVE INDUSTRIES
1. INTERNATIONAL BEST PRACTICES FOR
IMPROVING HEALTH AND SAFETY IN THE
EXTRACTIVE INDUSTRIES IN NIGERIA
BY
ABUBAKAR UMAR MUNGADI
2. OUTLINE OF THE PRESENTATION
1.0 INTRODUCTION
1.1 EXTRACTIVE INDUSTRIES
1.2 WORKING ENVIRONMENT
1.3 OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY LINKAGE
WITH WORKING ENVIRONMENT
2.0 IMPACTS OF EXTRACTIVE INDUSTRIES ON HEALTH
AND SAFETY
3.0 BEST PRACTICES FOR IMPROVING HEALTH AND
SAFETY
4.0 GOVERNMENT ROLE IN ENSURING HEALTH AND
SAFETY/NESREA MANDATE
5.0 CONCLUSION
3. 1.0 INTRODUCTION
The health impact of extractive industries
activities, including mining and oil/gas drilling,
has generated growing concern across the
globe and raised important questions about
the social and political forces and
governance structures underpinning these
activities. Although many would argue that
mining and drilling are necessary to support
the global economy, there are important
counterarguments about how extractive
industry activities could be better regulated,
contained, or even eliminated in order to
reduce the negative effects on human and
environmental health.
4. 1.1 EXTRACTIVE INDUSTRIES
Extractive industry means any process that involves the
extraction of raw materials from earth to be used by
consumers. Extractive industry consists of any
operations that remove metals, mineral and aggregates
from earth. Examples of extractive process include oil
and gas extraction, mining, dredging and quarrying.
1.2 WORKING ENVIRONMENT
This is a place where one works. It signifies all the
external factors such as air, land and water that are
influencing life and activities of people, plants and
animals. Although working environment provides many
economic and other benefits, a wide array of workplace
hazards also present risks to the health and safety of
people at work. These include but are not limited to,
"chemicals, biological agents, physical factors, adverse
ergonomic conditions, allergens, a complex network of
safety risks," and a broad range of psychosocial risk
factors.
5. POLLUTED AIR AND DEGERADED LANDS AS ARESULT
OF UNSUSTANABLE PRACTICES OF MINING
7. 1.3 OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY
LINKAGE WITH WORKING ENVIRONMENT
According to World Health Organization (WHO)
Occupational health deals with all aspects of
health and safety in the workplace and has a
strong focus on primary prevention of hazards.
Health has been defined as a state of complete
physical, mental and social well-being and not
merely the absence of disease or infirmity.
Occupational health is a multidisciplinary field
of healthcare concerned with enabling an
individual to undertake their occupation, in the way
that causes least harm to their health. Health has
been defined as it contrasts, for example, with the
promotion of health and safety at work, which is
concerned with preventing harm from any
incidental hazard, arising in the workplace.
8. Under Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) of
1970, employers are responsible for providing safe and
healthful workplace. Since 1950, the International
Labour Organization (ILO) and the World Health
Organization (WHO) have shared a common definition
of occupational health. It was adopted by the Joint
ILO/WHO Committee on Occupational Health at its first
session in 1950 and revised at its twelfth session in
1995. The definition reads
‘’The main focus in occupational health is on three
different objectives:
the maintenance and promotion of workers’ health and
working capacity;
the improvement of working environment and work to
become conducive to safety and health and
development of work organizations and working cultures
in a direction which supports health and safety at work
and in doing so also promotes a positive social climate
and smooth operation and may enhance productivity of
the undertakings’’
9. 2.0 IMPACTS OF EXTRACTIVE INDUSTRIES
ON HEALTH AND SAFETY
Many studies on the health effects of extractive
activities are focused on a specific site, making it
difficult to provide evidence from the literature
about generalized health impacts. While some
national databases exist to report injuries and
deaths as well as compliance with occupational
health laws, they are often too unreliable to
meaningfully cite, especially in the lowest income
countries, where extractive industry activity is
most dangerous.
Healthcare workers are exposed to many hazards
that can adversely affect their health and well-
being. Long hours, changing shifts, physically
demanding tasks, violence, and exposures to
infectious diseases and harmful chemicals are
examples of hazards that put these workers at risk
for illness and injury.
10. Occupational health injuries and illnesses impose
significant health and social costs to workers and
their families. Historically mining was among the
deadliest of occupations due to brown lung
disease, fatal explosions and mine collapses.
Mining, especially coal mining, causes extremely
high occupational mortality. Due to poor ventilation
in underground shafts, miners are exposed to
harmful gases, dust, toxins, and heat, leading to
silicosis and other lung diseases, heat stroke, and
cancer.
The problems that are commonly associated with
most Extractive Industries in Nigeria are lack of
information about the ore (exploration), Use of
labour intensive technology, unskilled labour force,
lack of written contracts, bad social image of
mining, subsistence economy, access to the
market only via intermediaries, market barriers,
illegality of Extractive Industries, lack of umbrella
14. 3.0 BEST PRACTICES FOR IMPROVING
HEALTH AND SAFETY IN EXTRACTIVE
INDUSTRIES
Conducting Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA)
before commencement of any major extractive industry
project.
Conducting Environmental Audit (EA) for existing
extractive industries after every three years.
The use of Personal Protective Equipments (PPE) must
be encouraged for health purposes.
The use of hazardous chemicals must be discouraged to
avoid contamination.
Mineral ore should be properly transported in covered
vehicles to avoid contamination.
Extracted minerals should not be stored or processed in
residential homes.
The use of underage and children should be
discouraged.
Mine out pits should be covered up, reclaimed with
15. 4.0 GOVERNMENT ROLE IN IMPROVING
HEALTH AND SAFETY IN EXTRACTIVE
INDUSTRIES/NESREA MANDATE
While National Governments ultimately bear
responsibility for preserving the public interest and
public health over extractive industries interests, a
variety of political and economic forces, often with
complicated historical roots, impede this protecting role.
The Government of Nigeria functions through various
MDAs. In the mining sector, there is the Ministry of
Solid Minerals, Federal Ministry of Environment, the
Regulatory Agency NESREA and other State
Government organs. Role of the government as a
stakeholder in the Extractive Industries include:
Development of appropriate, consistent, and
transparent policy and regulatory framework that
focuses on both the facilitation and management of
extractive industries;
16. Ensure environmental quality and integrity by evolving
environmental laws and standards that are enforceable;
Enforce compliance with the laws and standards;
Involve the stakeholders in the evolution of these
regulations, laws and standards and popularize them at
the end; and
Sensitisation and public enlightenment among Artisanal
miners with the aim of formalising the sub sector for
effective compliance monitoring.
The National Environmental Standards and Regulations
Enforcement Agency (NESREA) a Parastatal of the
Federal Ministry of Environment is charged with the
responsibility of enforcing environmental laws,
regulations and standards and deterring people,
industries and organization from polluting and degrading
the environment. The vision of the Agency is to ensure a
cleaner and healthier environment for all Nigerians while
her mission is to inspire personal and collective
responsibility towards building an environmentally
conscious society for the achievement of sustainable
development in Nigeria.
17. In the performance of her function NESREA had
developed 33 National Environmental Regulations
cutting across different sectors of the environment. To
minimize pollution and environmental degradation from
mining and processing of coal ores and industrial
minerals using efficient cleaner technologies that are
environmentally friendly and compatible with public
health, NESREA evolved national regulations on mining
and quarrying operations as follows;
National Environmental (Mining and processing of coal,
ores and Industrial Minerals) Regulations. 2009, and
National Environmental (Quarrying and Blasting
Operation) Regulations. 2013.
The Agency in collaboration with relevant Ministerial
Departments and Agencies State and Local
Governments Areas is compiling an inventory of all
quarries for the purpose of environmental compliance
monitoring. Along that line, the Agency has conducted
series of education awareness programmes to artisanal
miners associations in Nassarawa, Ekiti, and Zamfara
States. Personal Protective Equipments were freely
distributed to the organizations during the exercise.
19. 5.0 CONCLUTION
The health impact of extractive industries activities
are better prevented than cured. Ways and means
of reducing occupational hazards to the lowest
possible level must be sought and where
circumstances and nature of the hazard permits,
they should be eliminated altogether. Today many
countries including Nigeria have laws and
regulations which govern the working conditions in
the industrial sector. These laws and regulations
are based on the idea that the improvement of
workplace conditions is to be organized and
performed by the three partners in labour relations
i.e. Government, Employers and Workers.
Regulations and best practices are effective only
to the extent they are enforced.
