- Project number: F 2570
- Institution: Federal Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (BAuA)
- Status: Ongoing Project
- Planned end: 2027-06-30
Description:
This project is intended to examine supply chains for industrial products, particularly focussing on logistics companies. The study ties in with the need for research and improvement within Germany, which results, among other things, from the high number of accidents during the loading and unloading of lorries (see German Statutory Accident Insurance DGUV, "Arbeitsunfallgeschehen 2022", p. 11). Inadequate safety and health communication between companies with supply relationships to one another is a contributory factor in all of these incidents. Part of the project will therefore be a comparative case study that juxtaposes two industrial production supply chains, including their intermediary logistics centres and freight forwarding companies. In addition, indicators for a possible culture of prevention along the whole will be analysed (mainly as they relate to leadership, communication and the handling of errors).
The qualitative study specifically investigates the factors that determine inter-company safety co-operation and communication at management and employee level.
Following expert interviews for field exploration, the second project phase (from May 2024) will see employees and managers surveyed at companies involved in two different supply chains for highly dissimilar products. Preferably, the first group of companies will be involved in production, transport, order picking, storage, trade and delivery of paper products and/or printed matter. For comparison, a supply chain is selected that represents a distinct contrast of both its products’ characteristics (e.g. chemical or pharmaceutical industry) and the resulting due diligence obligations. For each supply chain, interviews will be conducted with occupational safety specialists, managers, procurers and senior works council members, as well as warehouse workers, lorry drivers and dispatchers who have regular contact with cooperating companies. In addition, there are plans for participatory research in the form of short-term participant observations at logistics centres, as well as analyses of company occupational health and safety documents. On this basis, design recommendations for inter-company occupational health and safety practice will be derived.