Significant changes in the socio-economic landscape in Guyana demand that the country’s policy-makers at both the public and private sector levels begin to create a radical shift in the manner in which they perceive the importance of safety and health in the workplace. “There is a real danger that sooner rather than later our ongoing failure to take account of the safety considerations at workplaces will lead us down the path of a crisis,” local safety and health instructor Dale Beresford told Stabroek Business.
“The challenges are twofold. It is not just a question of getting our heads around our current workplace safety and health responsibilities which we have seriously neglected over the years. It is also a question of beginning to contemplate those evolving and new safety and health challenges that are arising out of developments like the significant expansion of the gold-mining and construction sectors as well as what we are told is the imminent emergence of an oil and natural gas industry. There is no persuasive evidence that we are anywhere near ready to meet the challenges associated with safety and health in these sectors,” Beresford said.
