20% of Russian production workers fulfil duties in unsanitary conditions

One in every five Russian production workers fulfil their duties in hygienic unsanitary production conditions, said First Deputy Labor and Social Development Minister Valery Yanvarev during his presentation at the third annual All-Russian Conference entitled 'Problem of protecting modern labor and developing labor relations.' Yanvarev said that according to the State Statistics Committee the number of workers who worked in hygienic unsanitary conditions was 19.2% or 3 million. Yanvarev also said that this indicator is increasing each year. It was 17.5% in 1999. The largest number of workers in this category include coal miners (60.3%), ferrous metallurgy (43.8%) and mining of ore and ferrous metals (36.8%). Among regions, the most unsanitary production was found in Chukotka (40.6%), Kamchatka Region (36.2%) and Murmansk Region (34.8%).

Yanvarev said that the main causes of this situation was poor funding, the low level of training and control, and poor production discipline. He also said that today not only employers but also labor unions are paying too little attention to the problem of labor security. Yanvarev also said that the number of injured in production-related industries fell by 16.5% over the last four years.

According to the World Labor Organization, 2 million people die each year in production-related industries. In Russia, 6 thousand die each year. Annually, 160 million people suffer from work-related accidents and sickness, including five million in Russia.