DIALOGUE ON INNOVATIONS: OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY ISSUES WERE DEBATED AT THE KIOSH 2023 INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION AND CONFERENCE IN ASTANA
IN ASTANA, MAY 24-26, EXPO INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION CENTRE HOSTED THE 11TH KAZAKHSTAN INTERNATIONAL OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY AND HEALTH EXHIBITION AND CONFERENCE - KIOSH 2023, WHICH WAS ATTENDED BY 468 DELEGATES AND 2,075 UNIQUE VISITORS
As part of the event, 49 companies from Kazakhstan, China, Pakistan, Russia and Uzbekistan exhibited their latest innovations and advanced solutions in Occupational Safety and Health at their stands. There were 19 companies exhibiting for the first time, offering a fresh perspective on the industry's challenges. KIOSH-2023 is not only a large-scale exhibition, but also the unique specialized platform in the country for debates and meetings, sharing experience and knowledge, demonstrating the recent advances in Occupational Safety and Health.
The format of this year's conference was refreshed, with specialised sessions divided up by day: on 25 May, occupational safety and health issues were covered, and on 26 May, experts debated highly topical issues of occupational safety. This change was aimed at maximising the efficiency of the conference, as well as providing more time for debate and the sharing of experiences among participants. These improvements gave participants extra networking opportunities and more fruitful interaction. The participants of the KIOSH-2023 Occupational Safety and Health Conference discussed issues such as how to ensure safety in the workplace, prevent occupational diseases in employees and introduce a new risk assessment at enterprises.
The conference mainly aims at creating an open dialogue and exchange of information between the government, the employer, enterprises and employees. The dialogue platform focused on a strategy session with Altai Kulginov, Deputy Prime Minister of the Republic of Kazakhstan, and Tamara Duissenova, Minister of Labour and Social Protection.
Altai Kulginov, in his welcoming speech, highlighted that the new social policy is one of the important components of our country's profound political modernisation and large-scale transformation of the economy. And a major step towards its implementation was the Social Code signed by the Head of State.
“The employer's responsibility for occupational safety shall be strengthened. Moreover, it is essential to strengthen state and public oversight of the labour sector. And the public oversight shall be given high priority, thus facilitating dialogue between the employer and the employee. Therefore our 'People's Control', which is now applied in 245 enterprises, shall be expanded. Furthermore, the zero-accident concept, which has been introduced in 420 enterprises, shall also be further developed. We believe that human life and health are of the highest value to us”, said Altai Kulginov.
The draft Concept of Safe Work in Kazakhstan was presented by Tamara Duissenova, Minister of Labour and Social Protection. The document presents a new occupational safety and health ideology and aims at switching from a cost-oriented to a risk-oriented model of occupational safety and health, and improving the quality of employees' working lives and saving labour resources occupied in the country's economy. The Minister of Labour and Social Protection briefed on the mechanisms for resetting the occupational safety and health system provided for in the Concept. “Rather than certifying production facilities for working environment, an occupational risk assessment is proposed to be introduced. It will be carried out against five criteria: harmfulness of working environment, injury rate, safety of equipment, provision of personal protective equipment, and morbidity rate. Implementation of this mechanism will result in a new classification of working environment according to the degree of occupational risk, not only for enterprises but also for specific workplaces”, said Tamara Duissenova. Also, a transition will be made from industry standards to PPE standards consistent with the level of protection of employees. In order to implement this, a separate Road Map will be developed involving employers, research institutes and PPE manufacturers that will outline the updating and development of new standards, the need for new PPE, as well as their production capabilities, with estimates of the associated financial costs. The next area of the Concept is the differentiation of insurance tariffs based on the degree of occupational risk.
Satybaldy Dauletalin, Chairman of the Federation of Trade Unions of Kazakhstan, welcomed the Ministry of Labor and Social Protection initiatives to switch from a cost-based to a risk-based model of BIOT. According to him, a compensation model of occupational safety and health management has been formed in Kazakhstan, which is based on the response to accidents that have already taken place. Developing certain approaches to incentivise employers to improve workplace safety is the approach taken by the country's major companies, as stated by Nikolai Radostovets, Executive Director of the Republican Association of Mining and Metallurgical Enterprises. As he said, a lot of leading companies in the sector already practice risk assessment and take certain measures to minimise risks.
Following the plenary session, foresight sessions were organised for the expert community, with the participation of Akmadi Sarbassov, First Vice-Minister of Labour and Social Protection to discuss "Model for Professional Competence Development" and Yerbol Ospanov, Vice-Minister of Labour and Social Protection to discuss "Digitalisation of Labour Protection as a Modern Challenge to Reality".
The agenda on the first day also included the Inspectors' Forum "Preventive Control and Social Partnership: New Challenges and Interaction", b2b meetings, Roundtable on Preventive Medicine issues.
On 26 May, experts discussed occupational safety issues, and the agenda included strategic and panel sessions and workshops supported by the Occupational Safety Committee of the Ministry of Emergency Situations of the Republic of Kazakhstan. At the first panel session, the experts talked about digital occupational safety as a new ESG trend, application of digital transformation in our country, and development of occupational safety through digitalization application.
At the second panel session, speakers from major energy, mining, oilfield service and oil and gas companies shared their experiences on accident risk reduction in the operation of corporate fleets of vehicles and special equipment.
Specially for conference participants, a workshop on fire safety was also held.
A total of 20 business events and workshops and 1 conference were held as part of KIOSH 2023, with 77 speakers attending.
KIOSH is held annually with the state support of the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection of the Republic of Kazakhstan. The official supporters are: Occupational Safety Committee of the Ministry of Emergency Situations of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Federation of Trade Unions of the Republic of Kazakhstan, "Atameken" National Chamber of Entrepreneurs of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Republican State enterprise on the Rigth of Economic Management "Republican Research Institute for Labour Protection of the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection of the Republic of Kazakhstan", Association of Legal Entities "Republican Association of Mining and Metallurgical Enterprises" (AMME), Association of Legal Entities "Kazakhstan Association of Oil, Gas and Energy Sector Organisations "KAZENERGY", Association "SIZ" of the Russian Federation, Institute of Industrial and Occupational Safety and Health IOSH (UK), Union of Builders of the Republic of Kazakhstan and Central Asia, Self-regulated Organisation of the Union of Legal Entities and Individual Entrepreneurs "National Association of Light Industry Enterprises "Qaz Textile Industry", Safe Driving Association, OSHA, Pakistan Safety Council.
Golden Partners were: Kazzinc LLP, ArcelorMittal Temirtau JSC, Kazakhstan branch of JMJ ASSOCIATES LTD.
Silver Partners of the event: Tengizchevroil, KAZ Minerals, and Caspian Pipeline Consortium-K.
The host of the event is Kazakhstan Exhibition Company Iteca and its international partner, ICA Events Group.
