Safety Climate and Occupational Injuries in the Iron and Steel Industries in Tanzania

Saumu Shabani, Bente Elisabeth Moen (), Teferi Abegaz and Simon Henry Mamuya
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Saumu Shabani: Department of Environmental and Occupational Health, School of Public Health and Social Sciences, Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences, Dar es Salaam 11103, Tanzania
Bente Elisabeth Moen: Department of Global Public Health and Primary Care, Centre for International Health, University of Bergen, 5020 Bergen, Norway
Teferi Abegaz: Department of Preventive Medicine, School of Public Health, College of Health Sciences, Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa P.O. Box 9086, Ethiopia
Simon Henry Mamuya: Department of Environmental and Occupational Health, School of Public Health and Social Sciences, Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences, Dar es Salaam 11103, Tanzania

IJERPH, 2025, vol. 22, issue 9, 1-13

Abstract: The iron and steel industries globally have a high prevalence of occupational injuries, which need to be reduced. Obtaining safety climate information from workers assists in understanding the safety status at the workplace. This study aimed to assess the safety climate in the iron and steel industries and its association with occupational injuries. A cross-sectional study was conducted in four iron and steel industrial sites in Tanzania. Three hundred and twenty-one workers from the production lines and 50 managers/supervisors participated. The data were collected by interviews using the Kiswahili version of the Nordic Safety Climate Questionnaire (NOSACQ-50) and the modified International Labor Organization (ILO) manual on methods for occupational injuries. The managers/supervisors scored higher than the workers in five of the NOSACQ-50 dimensions. Most workers with low scores on safety climate had experienced occupational injuries. Analyses of the workers who had been injured at work showed that the dimensions ‘management safety priority and ability’, and ‘management safety justice’ were significant predictors of occupational injuries in the iron and steel industries, when adjusting for working years and working hours per day. This indicates that safety climate is a predictor of occupational injuries, and it is important to improve the safety priorities and commitments among the employees.

Keywords: iron and steel industries; occupational injury; safety climate (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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