Dust in China's Stone Processing Enterprises Exceeds National Standard by Up to 852 Times

2013-12-09 819 0人评论
       Recently, the State Administration of Work Safety issued a notice requiring all localities to strengthen dust hazard control in cement manufacturing enterprises and stone processing enterprises.

  From May to August 2013, the State Administration of Work Safety organized testing agencies to conduct research and on-site testing at 31 cement manufacturing enterprises and 20 stone processing enterprises in 6 provinces across the country, and found that dust concentrations in workplaces generally exceeded national standards. Among them, the total dust concentration at stone processing positions exceeded the standard by up to 852 times, and the respirable dust concentration exceeded the standard by up to 177.61 times. In addition, the vast majority of stone processing enterprises are in a small, scattered, and disorderly production state. In particular, enterprise heads, occupational health management personnel, and workers generally have not received occupational health training, and awareness of occupational disease prevention and control is weak; in positions exposed to occupational disease hazards, some enterprises illegally use labor dispatch workers to evade their main responsibility for occupational disease prevention and control.

  In response, the notice requires that all cement manufacturing and stone processing enterprises strictly comply with the requirements of the Law on the Prevention and Control of Occupational Diseases and the Provisions on Supervision and Administration of Occupational Health in Workplaces, establish and implement dust hazard prevention and control responsibilities at every level, organize employees in accordance with the law to undergo pre-employment, in-service, and post-employment occupational health examinations, and establish occupational health surveillance files for employees.

  The notice emphasizes that starting in November this year, all regions should take about one year to carry out concentrated special treatment activities. Those that still fail to meet dust prevention engineering treatment requirements and whose dust concentrations exceed standards by the end of May 2014 shall be ordered to stop operations that generate dust hazards; those that still fail to meet requirements by the end of October 2014 shall be reported to local governments for closure in accordance with the law.

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