The Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation is teaming with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and Ohio’s craft-brewery associations to form the Ohio Craft Brewery Alliance with a goal to raise awareness and develop safety education and training specific to the industry. The Ohio Craft Brewers Association, the Master Brewers Association of the Americas and the Brewers Association are joining the state agencies for a ceremony today at 1 p.m.
Participants in the new alliance would work to provide education to brewery owners and employees about safety and health issues specific to craft brewers. Issues expected to be addressed include grain handling, keg filling, chemical exposure, bottling, canning and delivering, according to the news release.
“As safety professionals, we must react quickly to meet the needs of employers in emerging industries that are still perfecting processes and learning important safety lessons as they grow,” Ibraheem “Abe” Al-Tarawneh, superintendent of the state BWC’s Division of Safety and Industrial Hygiene, said in the news release. “This alliance will help employers in Ohio’s budding craft brewery industry assess their workplaces and correct hazardous conditions that have the potential to cause injury.”
The BWC would connect participating breweries to the array of safety resources and programs available through its safety-and-hygiene division and OSHA’s on-site consultation program.
The agency’s workplace-safety professionals, industrial hygienists and ergonomists help businesses develop and maintain effective safety-management programs at no additional charge to the employer, the statement said.
[…] “In addition to safety challenges common to all manufacturers, breweries face unique risks associated with material handling and difficult working surfaces as well as exposure to scalding liquids and electrical systems in wet areas,” Brewers Association safety ambassador Matt Stinchfield said in a statement about the new initiative. […]