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Author: Admin | 2025-04-28
Although Chile's workplace accident rate has been dropping steadily, the Aug. 5 San Jose mine accident that trapped 33 miners has drawn attention to deficiencies in the enforcement of regulation, particularly in small companies.Mining Safety Record In Chile's mining industry, serious accidents are now rare and the accident rate is lower than in almost all other sectors, including the retail and services industries as well as the transport industry (which has the highest rate), manufacturing and construction. However, in addition to lax supervision, three aggravating factors appear to have contributed to the San Jose accident:--Accident rates are much higher in small and midsized mines such as San Jose, than in the large mines operated mostly by large international companies.--Mining accidents are more frequent in underground mines than open-cast operations. Between 1990 and 2005, the former accounted for 58.5% of mining deaths in Chile as compared to 12.5% in open-cast operations (with the remainder accounted for by processing plants or prospecting).--The San Jose mine was closed between 2007 and 2008, but when copper prices rise, as has happened since their collapse in late 2008, there is a strong incentive to reopen mines, without their owners necessarily having carried out proper maintenance in the intervening period.Overall accident decline. According to government figures, Chile's overall rate of non-fatal workplace accidents dropped to 5.3 per 100 insured workers in 2009, down from 7.6 in 2002 (although deaths have held steady at around six per 100,000 workers).This decline is attributed largely to the work of the three privately managed workplace health and safety mutual associations into which Chilean companies can pay a risk-adjusted percentage of their payroll, rather than the state social security system. Like the state system, these associations provide free medical care for workers suffering work-related accidents or illnesses, and pay benefit for
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