Identification and Structuring of the Workplace Risk Factors Regarding Power Press Machines

Industrial accidents have been consistently increased in terms of medical costs, lost work days, and incidence rates every year in Korea. Since the infrastructure of the industry changed shifts rapidly from 1980s in the developing countries such as South Korea, the nature and magnitude of the industrial accidents have also undergone a major shift. The situation is especially severe in small-to-medium sized industry(SMI). This article reports the development of a systematic evaluation system of risk factors specifically for the SMIs. The new approach introduced by this article is geared to the systematic identification and evaluation of the injuries from power press machines using the Analytic Hierarchy Process with the key evaluation data generated and evaluated by the employees on site. A total of 21 companies was studied and surveyed using the hierarchical structures of the cause-effect relationship of the mechanical injuries and their countermeasures. For the relative weighting of each risk factor, separate questionnaire survey was conducted for the selected workers from each company who had worked for more than 10 years in press work. Most participants (48 out of 62) replied that human attributes were the most significant factors for mechanical injuries fellowed by administration, machine, and work environment factors. The result also showed that the self-motivated risk assessment and safety enhancement activities would be an effective and efficient way of managing the risk factors in the SMIs.