Addressing the risk factors for work-related stress in Zambia

LUSAKA (ILO News) – Besides having a negative effect on workers’ health and wellbeing, work-related stress can have a considerable damaging impact on the productivity of an enterprise and the broader national economy, ILO Director for Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique, Alexio Musindo stated on World Day for Safety and Health at Work.

Speaking during the commemoration of the event whose theme was “Workplace Stress: A collective challenge”, Musindo highlighted that a growing number of recent studies have come to the conclusion that a poor psychosocial work environment can lead to work-related stress which in turn results in increased likelihood of distractions, errors in judgement, or failure in the performance of normal activities by workers.

Evidence further suggests that factors such as high workload and job demands, low decision latitude, low skills, and lack of organizational support, conflicts with supervisors and colleagues, or highly monotonous work are linked to a higher likelihood of injury in an occupational accident.

Other findings also indicate that mental ill-health (in particular burnout) contributes to unsafe working practices and increases the likelihood of workplace accidents.
The recommended measures to be taken include;

• Generation and compilation of national data on the subject, to inform the development of the intervention measures needed to address the issue of work-related stress.
• Embracing new approaches to labour administration- going beyond the traditional approach and incorporate the identification, assessment and control of hazards that could increase the risk of work-related stress.
• Paying closer attention to psychosocial hazards, in particular, as their potential to cause psychological or physical harm is the main cause of work-related stress.
• Training and skilling of occupational safety and health inspectors, labour officers and other labour and safety and health practitioners which will enable them to competently address the factors that lead to work-related stress
• Implementing collective risk assessment and management measures for psychosocial risks.
• Adopting collective and individual preventive and control measures and engage workers and their representatives in their implementation.
• Improving the coping ability of workers by increasing their control over their tasks;
• Enhance organizational communication.
• Allowing workers’ participation in decision making and;
• Taking into account the interrelation between working and living conditions.
• Meanwhile, Deputy Minister of Labour and Social Security Ms Alfreda Kansembe urged all workplaces to invest in occupational health and safety and build a preventive culture across the country. She further directed all work places to establish safety committees at places of work and to conduct risk assessments on OSH as a first step.

She further announced that the government of Zambia together with the social partners are now in the process of finalising the draft national policy on occupational safety and health which will enforce the provisions of occupational safety and health legislation.
Equally, the government is also working with the Zambia Bureau of Standards (ZABS) to develop and implement national standards on occupational safety and health.

Situation of Occupational Safety and Health in Zambia

Zambia, in 2013, ratified the following ILO conventions: C081 - Labour Inspection Convention, 1947; C155 - Occupational Safety and Health Convention, 1981; and C187 - Promotional Framework for Occupational Safety and Health Convention. Considering that these conventions provide policy frameworks with which to implement the remedial measures to address occupational safety and health challenges, including work-related stress, the government and the social partners now need to hasten the domestication of these conventions.