Health and Safety for Landbased Industries Session 3 - Risk Assessments

This resource is suitable to support Level 2 Agriculture courses.

Aims of the session

At the end of this session you will be able to:

Describe the risk assessment requirements for land-based industries.

Explain what is meant by the following:

Introduction to risk assessments

To ensure a safe working environment, it is necessary to be aware of the activities that take place on the farm and identify hazards which could cause a risk to health and safety. The risk may be to those working on the farm; those visiting, including contractors, other self-employed tradesmen or company salesmen; neighbours and other members of the public.

Why are risk assessments important?

Risk assessments are the main requirement of health and safety regulations. It is a legal requirement to assess risks.

If there are children living on or regularly visiting the farm,they should be included in the risk assessment.

Hazards, which could be assessed as low risk to adults, can be of high risk to children and young people. The most vulnerable children are between one to five year old and 11 to 15.

Are all risks the same?

Some activities may have a risk factor, but the scale of the risk could be so small that no major control measures need to be put in place.

Other activities may have a greater risk factor and more detailed safety control measures need to be put into place.

Terminology to understand

What is a HAZARD?

A hazard is anything with the potential to cause harm e.g. Chemicals; electricity; dust; fumes and organisms.

What is a RISK?

A risk is the chance, great or small, of the hazard causing harm.

What is ‘Risk Assessment’?

Risk assessment is the process of looking at your business activities and identifying any hazards.

Once a hazard has been identified it is necessary to assess what degree of risk this poses to people.

Once the level of the risk has been assessed precautionary measures, as is reasonably practicable, should be put in place.

Any precautions or measures already in place should be checked to ensure that they comply with your legal duties under the HSW Act 1974

Simple steps to Risk Assessment

1. Identify the hazard
2. Assess extent of harm from hazard and to whom and how
3. Assess the degree of risk and if existing precautions also known as control measures are adequate
4. Record findings
5. Review the assessment regularly

Terminology check!

What are meant by Control Measures?

Control measures include actions that can:

• either be taken to reduce the potential of exposure to the hazard,
• remove the hazard,
• reduce the likelihood of the risk of the exposure to that hazard being realised.

Step 1: Look for the hazards

Examine your workplace and look for situations or work activities that could cause significant harm.

Step 2: Decide who might be harmed and how

The whole range of people on the farm must be identified and a decisionn needs to be made to see if they are likely to be harmed.

These include:

• Self employed
• Children on the farm
• Employees
• Visitors
• Neighbours
• Other members of the public.

Step 3 - Evaluate the risks and decide whether existing precautions are adequate or more should be done.

There are many questions to ask...

• Is the degree of risk high, medium or low?
• Can the hazard be removed?
• What can be done to minimise the risk to health and safety if the hazard cannot be removed?
• What control measures - precautions - must you put in place to reduce the risk?

Further questions to ask...

• Have you given adequate instruction and training for personnel, so that they carry out their work in the safest possible way?
• Do the precautions meet legal requirements, comply with industry standards, represent good practice and reduce risk 'as far as reasonably practicable'.
• Is the use of Personal Protective Equipment the last control measure, when all other control measures have been put in place?
• Are the PPEs the correct type for the hazard and job to be done?

Step 4 : Record your findings

If you have more than 5 employees, you must record the hazards and write your conclusions.

You should also inform your employees about the findings.

If you have fewer than 5 employees you do not need to write anything down.

Step 5: Review your risk assessment

Review the assessment at regular intervals, or when a new machine is being used or a different way of doing a task is used.

Examples of Hazards

Work situations that could cause harm:

Terminology

What is a ‘Generic risk assessment’?

Generic risk assessments assess the hazards and risks involved in work tasks and activities. They can be used in different locations and by different companies for activities that are the same or similar.

What is a ‘Site specific’ risk assessment?

Site-specific risk assessments are risk assessments that have been adapted to a specific site, and only contain relevant information for that particular project. Site-specific risk assessments take into account the actual site conditions and type of work and only looks at the relevant hazards.

What is a ‘Task specific' risk assessment?

This type of risk assessment is for one individual carrying out a specific task at a given time.

What is a method statement in Risk assessing?

Method statements are documents that detail exactly how to carry out work safely.

Each task is broken down into steps, and the method statement assesses the hazards involved in each step before describing exactly how to control hazards and reduce risks.

An example of a risk assessment

Taking cows on heat (bulling) to a bull for service:

• A farmer has a Friesian bull in a bullpen The bull has a ring in his nose.
• The pen has all the features that a well designed bull pen should have.
• When cows are brought to service, the bull is handled by 2 staff, the younger being over 18 years of age.
• A safe system of work has been set and is followed at all times No bull should be trusted.

In the above example, all adequate precautions have been taken to reduce the risk of injury to the farm staff, as far as is reasonably practicable.

What were the control measures in place by the farmer?

• The bull is in a properly constructed bull pen, suitable for the purpose.
• The bull has a ring in his nose, which is according to HSE guidelines – all bulls should be ringed at 10 months of age.
• The bull is being handled by 2 members of staff – again as per HSE guidelines.
• It mentions that the youngest is over 18 years of age – HSE states that ‘generally, bull handlers must be between 18 and 65 years of age’.
• Finally, a ‘safe system of work has been set and is followed at all times’.

Conclusion to the risk assessment on taking the cow to the bull

In this example, all precautions, that can be taken, have been taken.

The risk to the health and safety is therefore considered to be LOW.

Check your learning

Task - Carry out a risk assessment for drilling a hole through a wall:

The Scenario:

• A newly qualified plumber is installing central heating to a far house.
• He needs to drill a hole through the wall from outside to inside. It is raining heavily.
• His 240 volt drill has a cable that has perished, exposing a bare live wire.
• The electric drill has not been checked regularly under the ‘Electricity at Work Regulations’.

Summary

At the end of this session, you are now able to:

Describe the risk assessment requirements for land-based industries.

Explain what is meant by the following: