Thanh Hoa (VNS/VNA) - Millions offishermen are exposed to the risk of accidents because of an unsafe workenvironment.

On March16, Nguyen Van Sy in the central province of Thanh Hoa and two other fishermenwere pulling up a 2.5-tonne fish net. The weight of the net and the fast movingwater pulled down a winch cable, which tightened around Sy’s ankles, cuttingoff his left foot and half of his right foot.

SignificantGovernment budgets are spent on ensuring work safety, but in sectors that donot have work safety officials and rarely have access to labour healthservices, like agriculture and fishery, workers are constantly facing deathtraps while trying to make ends meet.  

Nguyen ThanhSang, a 60-year-old fisherman from Thanh Hoa province’s Hoang Thanh commune,often starts his day at 3am. Like other locals, Sang and his son fish off theircommunal beach on a simple raft. “We hardly ever wear life jackets, and don’tthink much about work safety,” Sang said.

“There was a time when we were pulling the net and a storm came, pulling usinto the sea,” he added. “We held onto the raft, climbed on it and returnedhome.”

The fear of having nothing to eat is bigger thanthat of losing his life, so he held onto his work despite the attendant risks.

Some 255 households in the commune make their livingby fishing, according to Le Huu Tu, Vice Chairman of the Hoang Thanh People’sCommittee. “Most of them fish inshore on a small scale, so they don’t care muchabout safety for their assets (boats, rafts) and labourers,” he said.

The commune itself isn’t equipped with expertiseand financial ability to provide training on labour safety at sea, he added.Some organisations came to the commune in recent years to provide fishermenwith fishery knowledge and raise awareness of work safety, but not on a regularbasis, he said.

Authorities visited each household in an attempt to persuade the fishermen tobuy insurance for their boats and labourers, but the only result was to remindfishermen to be more vigilant about safety, he added.

Laboursafety at sea is a complicated issue, not only due to an often harsh workenvironment, but also unforeseeable factors such as extreme weather thatcould cause fatal accidents. But most fishermen haven’t been trained to dealwith these hazardous conditions, said Nguyen Anh Tho, deputy director ofthe Department of Work Safety under the Ministry of Labour, Invalids and SocialAffairs (MOLISA).

Somevessel owners are ignorant of safety risks, and do not carry equipment such aslife jackets and lifeboats; some do prepare but with outdated equipment,according to Tho. “A specific strategy is obviously much needed in order toamplify the importance of work safety in this sector,” he said.

Fishermen mostly contribute capital to purchase vessels, sail and worktogether without contracts, so it’s difficult for the authorities to protectthem if they don’t protect themselves with work safety equipment,according to Nguyen Viet Thang, Chairman of the Vietnam Fisheries Association.

Authoritiesare often unaware of accidents, which are settled by money among fishermen.
Acknowledgingthat not enough attention has been paid to ensuring work safety for fishermen,farmers and freelance labour, Nguyen Tien Dung, MOLISA’s chief inspector, hasproposed to the ministry to conduct more inspections of this informal labourmarket (one without labour relations) from 2018.  

The inspectorate has also proposed that specialists in the agricultural,fishery and informal labour sectors from MOLISA’s Department of Work Safety beauthorised to conduct inspections in these sectors.    

Thơ said amendments to the Law on Labour Safetyenabled the informal labour sectors to receive support from the Government andlocalities since July 2016. Some, like Thai Binh and Thanh Hoa provinces,saved parts of their budgets to support job training and awareness-raisingactivities for informal labourers.

A national programme on labour safety and hygiene in 2016-2017 also opened worksafety training classes in these sectors, he said.-VNA