Today, a report summarizing the 10th anniversary of the Agreement for Safety in the Construction Industry, to which we are a signatory, has its premiere. It is something to brag about! Over the course of the decade, safety on Polish construction sites has improved significantly - we were in the last place in terms of accidents across the EU, today we are ahead of Austria, France or Belgium. The number of serious accidents dropped by as much as 75%, and the number of fatal accidents by 63%!
The report of the Agreement for Safety in the Construction Industry shows that during 10 years of the organization's activity, the number of casualties at construction sites in Poland has almost doubled from 8684 to 4743. Today, there are four times fewer fatal accidents per 100 thousand employees in the construction industry than a decade ago. The association of the largest construction companies in Poland, which works for the improvement of work safety, is a great asset.
Between 2009 and 2019, the number of people who were injured in accidents on construction sites fell by 45 percent in Poland. During this time, the number of accidents in the whole economy decreased by only 4 percent. The greatest decrease was recorded among serious accidents (by 75 percent) and in the number of fatal accidents (by 63 percent). According to Eurostat, in the years 2009-2018, among all EU countries, Poland improved safety on construction sites the most. From the country with the highest number of fatal accidents per 100 thousand employees (21.49), it was among the countries with the lowest rate of the most serious events (5.18).
The mission of the largest general contractors, associated in the Agreement, is to reduce the number of accidents on construction sites by promoting a safety culture, raising awareness of the dangers of working on the site and preventing risks and accidents.
The business partner cooperating with the signatories of the Agreement meets the same health and safety requirements in the agreement. There is one system of obligatory training in occupational health and safety in the Agreement. An effective tool to popularize the OSH culture in the industry is the Safety Week organized by the Agreement. It is held under the honorary patronage of the Chief Labour Inspector. It is the largest initiative in Poland to promote the OSH culture, which gathers thousands of participants every year. The report "Polish Construction Industry in the Years 2009-2019. State of Safety and the Activity of the Agreement for Safety in Construction" is a summary of the activity of general contractors' organizations, which this year celebrates its 10th anniversary.
