In Yara, safety and health in the workplace is our number one priority. Believing that every accident is preventable and working consistently towards a zero accident rate, Yara Industrial in Bad Hönningen, Germany won the bronze medal for “Safety and Environment in the workplace” from the The European Industrial Gases Associations (EIGA), for five years without a single lost time incident. Being an extraordinary example of clear and consistent work, we are happy to celebrate their second award this year.

Besides the EIGA, Bad Hönningen also won the 2014 Industrial Gas Association Germany (IGV) Safety Award, for 690,000 consecutive safe work hours.

“We are very happy to have won another safety award,” says Industrial Safety Manager in Germany, Udo Probst. “Our work to become an industry example is demonstrated, internally and externally in our commitment to, and ambitions for safety. Aiming for an incident-free workplace requires great efforts - and it is excellent that we now are recognized for that.”

The EIGA member companies are the only ones entitled to enter and nominate themselves for these awards. To be able to do that they must fulfill standards of performance and lead as an example in occupational safety and environmental compliance.

Good teamwork

"The culture is clearly a result of good teamwork," says Udo Probst. “With 65 employees working at the German site the safety record is quite an achievement. We now see that having achieved the full acceptance of all employees and contractors, the goal we had was far from unrealistic!”

Another secret to success at the Bad Hönningen plant is regular internal training sessions for employees and managers as well as the established safety committee and barrier removal group meetings. The extended team discuss all necessary safety issues around the gas and nitrates business and also take part in a range of observational walk instructions, defensive driving courses, and safety training for products, equipment and vehicles, as needed.