Analysis on the relationship between accident ratio of machinery, metal, and non-metal mineral product manufacturing and improvement ratio of risk factors classified according to the KRAS

Abstract

Currently, 76.6% of businesses in South Korea that are required to appoint safety managers have outsourced their safety management tasks to specialized safety management institutions. As a result, the role of these institutions is crucial. However, these institutions lack standardized inspection items for workplaces, and there are no specific regulations that enforce the improvement of identified risk factors in the submitted inspection reports. This leads to a low improvement rate and a lack of reduction in the accident rate. This study focuses on 10 businesses in the machinery, metallic, and non-metallic mineral products manufacturing industry in the southern region of Gyeonggi Province, South Korea. Over a period of three years, the contents of inspection reports submitted by these businesses were classified into six categories: mechanical factors, electrical factors, chemical(substance) factors, biological factors, task-specific factors, and work environment factors, according to the Korea risk assessment system(KRAS) classification. Regression analysis and Pearson correlation analysis were conducted to find out the relationship between the improvement rate and the accident rate. The results of the regression analysis confirmed that the improvement rate of risk factors provided by specialized safety management institutions significantly affects the accident rate in the workplace. The correlation analysis results indicate a significant correlation between the improvement rates and accident rates of the five factors excluding biological factors for which no inspection items were identified. Based on these findings, the study identified inspection items within the reports that had a low improvement rate and were repeatedly pointed out. Additionally, priority improvement items were derived based on the industry's characteristics. This study proposes checklists that can be utilized for safety inspections in the machinery, metallic, and non-metallic mineral products manufacturing industry. It is expected that by utilizing these safety inspection checklists, the accident rate in these workplaces can be reduced.