Our annual Health and Safety Performance Report is an important long-term initiative of the Australian chemistry industry. It has provided detailed insights into the industry’s health and safety performance since 2000.
The Report plays a central role in improving health and safety performance for the sector, providing insights to help businesses benchmark and identify areas for future improvement.
It is also important in promoting the principles of health and safety to industry value chain partners, external stakeholders and the broader community, and allows the industry to share examples of best practice and encourage others to act.
We are pleased to present the results of the 2024 Health and Safety Performance Report.
Key takeaways include:
- Sadly, the sector recorded a fatality in 2024 – the first in more than a decade of reporting.
- The loss of a valued member is a timely reminder of the importance of ensuring every worker returns home safely. The industry remains committed to zero fatalities in the Australian chemistry sector.
- Elsewhere, the overall safety results remain very good. However, the sector recorded increases in key metrics; Lost Time Injuries, Medical Treatment Injuries, and Work Days Lost Per Employee.
- These results indicate the need for an increased focus on workplace health and safety during the next few years to understand and address the underlying factors.
- Manual handling injuries are decreasing but remain a leading injury type for our industry.
Australian Work Health and Safety Strategy
In 2024, Chemistry Australia members remain one of the safest groups in Australia, achieving very good results overall.
The report continues a new decade of alignment with Safe Work Australia’s Australian Work Health and Safety Strategy, which focusses on reducing worker fatalities, injuries and illness.
During the current 10 year strategy period, our approach will target specific injuries and key areas of interest:
- Zero fatalities
- Equal to or less than 3.5 per cent injury rate
- A reduction in the rate of serious injuries
Chemistry Australia will also measure and report mental health injury rates to better understand our performance in this critical area, while monitoring areas that require closer examination; Workdays Lost Per Employee (WDLPE), injuries related to age, and physical injuries.
The current strategy provides members with the opportunity to reflect anew on strategies to reduce the frequency of injuries, particularly in the most persistent areas for our sector.
We congratulate members on their solid results and continued leadership and commitment to the health of workers, communities and the environment.
Additional resources for participants
Every company that participates in the Health and Safety Performance Report receives a confidential Benchmarking Report.
This valuable tool allows members to benchmark their own results against peers, promote internal discussion, gain new insights and generate ideas to drive further improvements in their workplace.
