According to the International Labour Organisation (ILO), there are 541 million young workers (15-24 years old) globally.  They account for more than 15 per cent of the world’s labour force and suffer up to a 40 per cent higher rate of non-fatal occupational injuries than adult workers older than 25.  They include 37 million 15-17 year olds in hazardous child labour

Many factors can increase youth vulnerability to Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) risks, such as their physical and psychological stage of development, lack of work experience and lack of training, limited awareness of work-related hazards and a lack of bargaining power that can lead young workers to accept dangerous tasks or jobs with poor working conditions.

Personally, while I believe it’s good for the youths to get trained, it’s even better to tackle these issues from the grassroots through prevention strategies. How can we train little children to have the safety mindset? Modifying future behaviour is the way to go and that can be achieved through a conscious Safety Education. What this does for society is:

1) We raise children who are naturally safety conscious as they have imbibed safety habits

2) Our schools get Safety education integrated into the curriculum to ensure a conscious knowledge transfer

3) When young people decide to take on jobs, they can make better choices because they know and understand the implication of unsafe choices to their lives

4) Knowledge is shared within the spheres of influence of these young people

How can we do this?
Asides the traditional way of teaching children, we can add innovation to make learning both fun and enlightening. Story books, movies, games and role play sessions are a great way to go.

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Intentionally grooming a safety conscious generation

Source of statistics: www.ilo.org

One of the major causes of accidents in the workplace is the human factor. This means even if everything functions well: the machines, provision of adequate breaks, presence of proper systems in place, if the individual involved does not comply with safety rules, accidents will still happen. Unfortunately, in this part of the world we tend to say “God forbid” more without putting adequate structures in place. We are not used to complying and it’s no wonder because it is not something that is consciously ingrained in us. From observation, people who are used to complying with safety rules either work in a workplace that takes safety seriously or have family and friends who do so.

However, as we all know, accidents can happen anywhere, any time and on any type of job. It is therefore important to begin to take safety education seriously. The Goal 4 of the SDGs implies that quality education should prepare tomorrow’s work force. Therefore we do not have to wait till people become employees before ingraining safety skills in them. They should be taught from childhood such that it becomes only natural to make the safe choice. It should be a part of the school curriculum because most habits taken into adulthood are mostly developed in the formative stages. This will help us build a society with reduced emphasis on human factor as being the major cause of accidents.

This observation led to the Train Them Young Initiative (#2TYI) started by Ulomka Multi Solutions Limited as a way of giving back to the society. It is done monthly across schools in different locations. Last week, staff of Ulomka Multi Solutions Limited led by Obianuju Nwadialor visited Okota Senior Secondary School, Okota to share some safety knowledge with the students. Students were taught basic safety skills: personal safety, fire safety, road safety and first aid. This is a mission to take safety education to schools and we strongly believe that all students hould have access to it.

Ulomka Multi Solutions Limited was also represented at the Round-table discussion organised by the One African Child Foundation in commemoration of its third anniversary. The event took place at the Mainland High School, Yaba in celebration of the Universal Children’s Day. The Managing Partner, Ugochi Obidiegwu had the opportunity to share her views on the importance of introducing safety education into the school curriculum. She also shared basic information to the students on fire safety.

Would you like your school to be a part of the Train Them Young Initiative (#2TYI)? Send an email to hello@thesafetychic.com