Hazardous Units: AP Takes Up App-Based Third Party Safety Audit
Geo-tagged inspections to track chemical storage, machinery and safety compliance
Vijayawada: With a view to ensuring industrial safety, the Andhra Pradesh government has come up with an app-based third-party safety audit in all hazardous industries in the state.
Experts would be involved in the entire process that will be recorded on a day-to-day basis, so as to ensure its transparency. The factories department internally developed the software application.
As industry managements have been instructed to conduct a third-party safety audit, they would hire experts for this purpose. Those others who intend to conduct the audit may upload their credentials, including academic qualifications and technical expertise, in the app.
As the app is geo-tagged, experts can record their entry into the app when audit experts reach the industrial unit. This can be done by noting the date and time, along with geo-coordinates.
They are supposed to record their observations during the audit, including the micro observations of presence, status and other details of storage and usage of chemicals, condition of machinery, processing, workforce, compliance with safety norms and a host of others.
They are also supposed to record the time of exit and the number of times they inspected a firm, and submit the final audit report to the department.
Factory authorities say this close monitoring of the conduct of third-party safety audit, including recording this on the app, would help avoid allegations of irregularities in the audit. There were complaints in the past that such auditing was done without visiting and inspecting the industries.
Nearly 350 major hazardous and hazardous industrial units have been identified for the third-party safety audit from August 1. Factories director in charge, Mohan Rao, said, “No audit will be accepted unless done with the help of the app.” Ever since the LG Polymers styrene gas leak mishap claimed 12 lives in Visakhapatnam in May 2020, the AP government has been striving to ensure industrial safety.
Meanwhile, the factories department is developing a dashboard with live updates on the ongoing exercise of safety audit to keep track of progress. This is likely to be available shortly.
