Informal Construction Workers Research Articles

The Dominant Factors of Occupational Accident Risk Potential in Jember Regency

<div><table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" align="left"><tbody><tr><td align="left" valign="top"><p><em>The construction industry sectors have a significant risk of work accidents, making it one of the industries with a relatively high level of risk. According to the ILO, in 2018, 2,78 million workers died each year due to work accidents (13,7%) and diseases due to occupation (86,3%). This study aims to analyze the risk of work accidents among informal housing construction workers in Jember Regency. This type of research is quantitative descriptive research. The research was conducted in housing that is under construction which is located in Sumbersari District, Patrang District, and Kaliwates District, Jember Regency. The population in this study involved informal construction workers in Jember Regency. The population in this study included an unlimited population because easily entered by anyone and as the characteristics of informal construction do not require special skills. The sampling technique used non-probability sampling techniques, the sample calculation used quota sampling. The number of samples used was 97 respondents. The Accidental Sampling technique was used to select the samples. Risk analysis was through the Delphi method. Based on the calculation of all the risks that exist, it is indicated that there are three hazard risks with priority status, which means that they require immediate treatment. The risk identified was the risk of falling at the roof work stage (CPE 211,22), the risk of electric shock during the electrical installation work stage (CPE 197,85), and the use of PPE during the roof work stage (CPE 184,75). There needs to be risk control concerning the hierarchy of hazard control.</em></p><p><em> </em></p></td></tr></tbody></table></div><strong><em>Keyword: </em></strong><em> <strong>Construction, informal, work accident</strong></em>

The effect of economical phenomenon on informal construction workers earnings within Covid-19 pandemic: A mixed method analysis

The informal sector is an alternative to getting a job without special conditions such as education level or job skills. These informal workers are often found in the construction sector. Informal construction workers have no social protection and are economically marginalized, making their economy worse during the Covid-19 pandemic. This study investigates informal construction workers' economic phenomenon, from big cities in Java Island, Indonesia, when facing difficult situations due to the pandemic of Covid-19 with the mixed method. First, the quantitative method gathered the questionnaire from 225 informal workers in the construction sector who experienced a drastic reduction in their regular income, even weekly or monthly. They take advantage of savings and increase debt to cover the reduced income. Then, the qualitative method was conducted to investigate the informal construction worker's economical phenomenon with in-depth interviews with five foremen and five construction field managers. During the pandemic, government programs to provide income support for informal workers have contributed less to informal sector workers. Thus, the results of this research can be used by the government or other parties to help provide better social protection to informal sector workers from a more significant economic recession due to the pandemic.

Occupational Health and Safety in Tanzanian Construction Sector: Incompliance, Informality, and Power Relations

The management of Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) on construction sites continues to be an area of concern. Workers have continued to be blamed for unsafe behavior, contributing to the increase in the number of accidents on construction sites. Although various legislative acts enforcing Health and Safety (HS) exist, incompliance with such legislation is evident. This study sets out to understand why construction managers and workers do not comply with OHS legislation. Interviews, focus group discussions, and observations were carried out with the construction site managers and informal construction workers on selected construction sites. Content and thematic analyses were adopted to analyze the data using Nvivo version 12, qualitative analysis software. The study confirmed poor OHS practices and concluded that the precarious nature of the workers’ jobs in the construction sector limits their power to demand the enforcement of OHS, resulting in them accepting the risks as wage-for-labor precariat. Site managers have limited power since they are employees of the main contractor, and their focus is on the completion of the construction projects. This study recommends the need to establish an inclusive safety management system that accommodates the main contractors, managers, and workers. Moreover, a review of the current OHS (building and construction) rules is recommended to recognize the precariat-informal construction workers, who are the main players on construction sites.

Shifting Tides of Informal Worker Resistance in Mexico: A Domestic Work‐Construction Contrast

Informal workers in Mexico, the majority of the country's workforce, have organised to demand rights, but with varying results. In this article, we contrast recent organising by Mexico's domestic workers and informal construction workers. Household worker movements have succeeded in institutionalising significant new organisations and raising public awareness. Construction workers, despite earlier militant counterexamples, have remained trapped by corporatist structures, and their organising capacity has atrophied. We place these outcomes in the context of the overall decline of labour, suggesting conclusions for the limits and possibilities of contemporary Mexican labour mobilisation.

Developing disaster risk reduction skills among informal construction workers in Nepal.

Capacity development has become an embedded component of the aid package offered by international organisations responding to humanitarian crises. The effectiveness of capacity development is, however, rarely monitored or examined. What is more, the local context and the learning preferences of trainees appear often to be overlooked. Yet, the informal construction sector is thriving throughout the world. Using a case study of Nepal, where construction and post-earthquake reconstruction projects are largely delivered by the informal construction sector, this paper analyses, therefore, how and whether informal construction workers successfully develop capacity and utilise trainings to create more disaster-resilient buildings. It goes on to assess how one can draw on the learning preferences of Nepalese construction workers to improve the effectiveness and the sustainability of capacity development initiatives. Lastly, the paper highlights that training programmes informed by the context and the preferred learning style of disaster-affected communities promote and sustain capacity development efforts.

Compliance with Building Material Specifications among Informal Skilled Construction Workers in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Informal construction workers rarely comply with Building Material Specifications (BMSs) due to incompetence emanating from knowledge gaps, cost reduction strategies among clients, poor material use and lack of quality checks and control mechanisms. Based on logistic regression model results on the relationship between compliance and knowledge transfer on BMSs, this study has noted a mismatch between informal knowledge transfer practices and compliance with BMSs during construction. This mismatch is partly attributed to inappropriate knowledge transfer on BMSs. Compliance with BMSs is mainly driven by appropriate knowledge transfer and trainer-trainee agreement for effective knowledge transfer. The "carrots and sticks" approaches to enforcing compliance with BMSs among informal craftsmen have marginal effect on the ultimate compliance behaviour of craftsmen. The conclusion is that although social capital through social network is considered useful for knowledge transfer it does little to induce internalisation of knowledge on BMSs leading to non-compliance. That is, positive attribute of knowledge transfer may not necessary yield positive compliance levels. However, since this argument is strongly tied to compliance as measured along instrumental, normative and constraints dimension, it may slightly change in an environment where habits and routine have a major role to play in construction practices.

Health and safety issues among construction workers in Bangladesh

Background: Bangladesh is a rapidly developing country. Lots of infrastructures are set up every year. A large number of people are working in the construction industry. Work related injuries and deaths of construction workers are common. The aim of this study was to find the health and safety awareness of informal construction workers.
 Methodology: This study was a cross sectional study by using a preset questionnaire among the construction workers in Bangladesh.
 Results: Participants of this study had lower income and education. About 87% of participants did not receive any health and safety training and did not wear safety equipment when they were working. About 57% of the participants had a history of injury. This study also found that the main reasons for the non-use of safety equipment were lack of safety equipment, motivation and training.
 Conclusion: Construction workers are not adequately aware about health and safety issues that relate to them.

Informal housing construction workers’ perceptions toward the improvement of effective leadership and performance

Practically, as other construction projects, the workforce in housing construction projects is still dominated by informal workers who belong to a group and controlled by a leader. Accordingly, developer companies consider that informal worker leaders play an important role in improving the informal workers’ performance in housing construction projects. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to explore the effective leadership style that can improve the performance of informal workers in housing construction projects based on the workers’ perceptions. The implications of this research can be used to improve the informal workers’ performance both of national and multinational developer companies so they can perform more effectively in completing housing construction projects. The research used qualitative method with phenomenological approach to reveal an assessment based on perceptions and perspectives of informal construction workers. Finally, it was found that the effective leadership style according to the informal workers’ perceptions is the transactional leadership which includes being liked by the workers, concerning and appreciating, as well as being consistent with commitments. Thus, effective performance and leadership will be achieved as informal construction workers will work hard under this leadership style.

Building resilience: Knowledge, experience and perceptions among informal construction stakeholders

Nepal is considered one of the most disaster-prone countries is the world, with vulnerabilities exacerbated by chronic poverty. Whilst a variety of sound buildings codes and regulations has been introduced in the past decades, a challenge exists in implementing these as the majority of the building stock is constructed by informal construction workers. Based on a case study of Nepal's Banepa Town, this paper aims to explore the role of knowledge, perceptions of and experiences with disaster risk reduction (DRR) measures among informal construction stakeholders. The paper highlights that whilst the level of awareness of hazards and knowledge of the importance of DRR measures among informal construction stakeholders is high, it is also important to consider perceptions and organisational challenges when finding the best solutions for promoting DRR measures. There is still a gap between transforming knowledge into practice, often because of the perceptions (such as trust, experience, and gender) that are predominant in the sector. Understanding these issues is important as this situation is not unique to Nepal: rapid urbanisation in many developing countries has similarly led to a boom in informal construction sectors and construction that has little regard for building codes and regulations.

Impact of heavy load activity on cardiovascular system: echocardiographic assessment of informal construction workers heart in Cameroon.

IntroductionPhysiological cardiac hypertrophy and dilation are common findings in heavy physical load activity. We carried out this study to investigate the relationship between construction work and cardiac parameters adaptations, by comparing healthy masons to office workers on heart ultrasound.MethodsThe study was carried out on, 50 construction workers and 50 office workers matched for their weight, height and age. Systolic and Diastolic blood pressures, Left Ventricular diameter and thickness, Septum wall thickness and Left ventricular mass index were measured and calculatedResultsHeart rate, systolic and diastolic blood pressures were lower in construction workers, as compared to office workers: respectively 63±7 bpm vs. 75±6 bpm (p = 0.000); 120.1±7 mmHg vs. 130.5±9 mmHg (p = 0.000) and 68.5±7 mmHg vs. 77.0 ±9 mmHg (p = 0.000). Construction workers had a thicker septum and posterior wall: respectively 10.3 ± 1.1 mm vs. 8.9 ± 0.9 mm (p = 0.000); and 9.0 ± 1.2 mm vs. 8.1 ± 0.8 mm (p = 0.000).ConclusionConclusion We deducted that heavy load work has an impact on the heart mensuration. The past occupational history has to be taken into consideration during initial medical assessing of a worker in for a new job so as to avoid erroneous conclusions.

Legal empowerment of workers in the informal economy: the case of the construction industry in Tamil Nadu, India

This article examines the opportunities and constraints related to legal empowerment of informal construction workers in Tamil Nadu in South India. The article demonstrates that while state-provided welfare schemes are important as an organizing tool for the trade unions, they also contribute to fragmentation of the union movement. Moreover, the article reveals the important role played by trade unions as intermediaries of social protection and consequently their role in the realization of survival and security rights. It is argued that the legal empowerment agenda is vague when it comes to how a balance between flexibility and security in the informal economy can be achieved, and challenges related to the present case are highlighted. The article concludes that changes in the legislative framework, enforcement of legal provisions and an extension of social protection measures are required to achieve substantial legal empowerment of informal construction workers in Tamil Nadu.

The Role of Mobile Phones in Tanzania’s Informal Construction Sector: The Case of Dar es Salaam

This paper explores how mobile phones are being used by informal construction workers in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. It reveals that ownership of mobile phones is stratified along employment lines. This observation acts as a good indicator of what is now perhaps the biggest split in employment in many developing economies: a split between a stratum of employers and middlemen (who in Dar es Salaam’s informal construction sector are also mostly using mobile phones), and a stratum of employees, apprentices, family labourers and marginal-owner operators (who are generally not using mobile phones). The applicability of government policy on information and communication technology (ICT) is assessed in the context of these findings. This leads to the suggestion that since Tanzania’s small-enterprise development policy concentrates on use of the internet, much of this is irrelevant to the majority of informal-sector construction enterprises which – when they do use ICT – rely almost exclusively on mobile phones as a significant cost-saving device.

Organizing informal workers in the urban economy: The case of the construction industry in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

This paper draws on a recent study of informal construction workers in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, to show how social dialogue was used in finding solutions to the encountered problems. The paper explains why the construction industry in general—and its informal sector in particular—is important for urban development. Following, the case study of Dar es Salaam is narrated with illustrations of practical experiences of how social dialogue was carried out. The conclusion draws together findings from the case and the literature that has been referred to. It links the findings of the case study with the theoretical framework of social dialogue.