ASSESSMENT OF OCCUPATIONAL AND HEALTH PRACTICES IN FURNITURE INDUSTRIES IN MINNA, NIGER STATE

Abstract

The study was design to assess the occupational and health practices in furniture industries in Minna, Niger State. Four-research questions and four null hypotheses were formulated to guide the study. A descriptive survey research was used for this study. The population of this study was 30 registered furniture industries in Minna metropolis, the respondents was comprise of 30 managers of the industries. Due to the manageable size of the study population, the study utilized the whole population, hence, there was no sample. The research instrument for data collection was structure questionnaire. The instrument was validated by three Lecturers in the Department of Industrial and Technology Education, Federal University of Technology, Minna. The instrument used for the data collection was administered to the respondents by the researcher and two research assistant in the study area. Mean and standard deviation was used to analyze the data collection for the study, while t-test statistics was used to test the null hypothesis. From findings, it reveals that all occupational safety and health practices in furniture industry are in good condition; this shows and provided that workers in furniture industries in Minna metropolis, always adhere to the use of available occupational safety and health facilities and also report all cases of any forms of accident to their supervisors, and further provide that the supervisors are performing their tasks optimally and also accidents can be prevented when tools are in good shape and are kept clean; as an accident is are unexpected, unplanned event or a sequence of events that occurs through a combination of causes that results in physical harm. The study therefore conclude that the burden of occupational health and safety problems lies on the shoulders of both the workers and the machinery. Based findings, the study recommends that; there should good maintenance of first aid room for the workers and workers should be more encouraged to report defective tools, test equipment to the supervisors among others.