Safety should not be only confined to the workplace, but practiced in every aspect of daily life.Ansa Technologies Ltd managing director Aleem Hosein made this point on Monday as the company launched its annual Health & Safety Expo at its Cipero Street, San Fernando compound, in commemoration of Safety Week.Hosein, speaking with reporters at the expo, said he believed that citizens did not place enough emphasis on safety and safe practices outside of their work environment.
This, he said, must be changed."We engage in safe practices whilst on the job and the minute you go home you cutting the lawn wearing slippers and you forget the safety aspects. What we want to encourage people to do is to be safe at work and at home," Hosein said.He said Ansa Technologies, through its three-day expo, was trying to encourage a change in the way people approach safety.
"It is a whole safety culture that we are trying to introduce and a whole lifestyle that we are trying to introduce in all the employees and the clients we interface with," he said.Ansa group Health, Safety and Environment manager Nixon Gangoo shared Hosein's views, declaring that people really do not take safety seriously.
"We talk about safety in work yet we are a country without a safety culture. We drive along the road way, break traffic lights, we drive down the shoulder. We have a huge amount of accidents, so we do not take safety seriously," Gangoo said. The HSE manager said citizens need to consider safety as a daily aspect of their lives."We need to make safety part of our life, not something that you just come to work and do. But something you eat, sleep, drink, safety," he said.
Safety Week runs from Monday to Friday of this week and it is an annual celebration to highlight the need to exercise safe practices at work and at home. Gangoo said the Ansa three-day expo is open to the public and is free of charge. David Inglefield, Sector Head of Retail Services at Ansa McAl Ltd, commended Ansa Technologies for its initiative which he said will be an annual event on the Ansa McAl calendar.
He urged Ansa McAl companies and all companies in T&T to set high standards as Ansa Technologies has and keep safe practices at the top of their minds.Nutritionists from Nestle, optometrists from Value Optical and other health services provided screenings and counseling to employees and visitors attending the expo. The company also seized the opportunity to market its wide range of products and safety gear it supplies.