Over 30 participants from 16 local garment factories attended BWEG’s virtual training on Fire Prevention Management on February 2. Attendants included OSH and compliance safety managers and OSH Committee workers representatives.

Via a string of joint, virtual exercises, the workshop aimed to help build the participants’ ability to develop factory systems to prevent fire incidents and follow up on the implementation of such systems.

Evacuation and rescue procedures were also among the topics of discussion. Despite a number of initiatives to curb fire accidents in the global garment industry, a significant number of fire occurrences across the sector still persists.

But taking proper safety measures can lessen the risk of fire as well as the great loss of life and property. According to the ILO, employers (and/or building owners or occupiers) should carry out a fire safety risk assessment and keep it up to date.

This shares the same approach as safety and health risk assessments and can be carried out either as part of an overall risk assessment or as a separate exercise. Based on the findings of BWEG’s factory assessments, employers need to ensure that adequate and appropriate fire safety measures are in place to minimize the risk of injury or loss of life in the event of a fire.