[Sponsored Report] Safety comes first for overseas Samsung C&T sites

Samsung C&T employees working at the Rabigh II power plant construction site test their balance on beams at the safety training center. Provided by the company

Safety matters on construction sites. Little mistakes could lead to tragic accidents and workers must be aware of their surroundings.

To prevent occupational injuries, Samsung Construction and Trading (C&T), the construction unit of the nation’s biggest conglomerate, established safety training centers at three of its overseas construction sites - the Lusail suspension bridge, Msheireb and Education City stations in Doha, Qatar, and the Rabigh II power plant in Saudi Arabia.

At each training center, workers experience eight examples of construction field accidents including falls from height, getting struck by falling objects, fire accidents and electrocution accidents. Going through each accident, workers learn the importance of prevention, such as properly wearing their safety gear. The trainees also learn how to safely handle frame scaffoldings, temporary structures and wire ropes.

The safety training center in Rabigh, which opened last November, has already provided education sessions to 40 groups. New employees are required to take education sessions from the center. They cannot participate in field work unless they receive a sticker that is given to them at the end of the session. Because power plant construction workers are from various nations such as India, Iran and Pakistan, the center provides education in three languages: English, Arabic and Hindi.

According to a Samsung C&T official, the training center plans to provide 50 monthly sessions not only for new employees but also for workers at other constructions sites.

Many workers welcome the opportunity to receive safety lessons and learn to protect themselves.

“It was not difficult to follow the instructors,” said Raju Kumar, the supervisor for scaffolding installation works who was a general worker at the Lusail site when he received the training.

“The sessions made me realize how incautiously I was working.”

The effectiveness of the training was proven by the first safety training center of the company in Qatar, which was built in April 2013 at the Lusail construction site. Every field worker at the site received safety training. As a result, the site recorded five million accident-free man-hours. Also, Lusail Real Estate Development Company (LREDC), the construction project’s client, recognized the company’s endeavors to allow no loopholes in safety procedures on site and awarded Lusail bridge as an exemplary case of accident-free construction twice.

“I wish the training centers bring a positive change to all of the construction sites in Qatar,” said Essa Mohammed Ali Kaldari, the CEO of LREDC.

The clients of other building projects and government authorities who visited Lusail’s safety center expressed great interest in the education sessions. Another client of Samsung C&T, Doha Metro, requested a training center at its construction site, which opened last January. Other constructors are benchmarking the company and making smaller-scale training centers in the field.

“Safety is the priority in our building operation and safety training centers are just one of our policies to keep every process accident free,” said a Samsung C&T official. “We are trying to make the safest construction sites in the world.”