Compliance with Occupational Safety Practice among Petrol Station Pump Attendants in Kaduna state, Nigeria

Abstract

Petrol pump attendants in Kaduna encounter numerous hazards at the pump. This constitutes the most important threat to their survival at the workplace. Unfortunately, there are very few researches evaluating compliance with safe practices among pump attendants in Kaduna South, Nigeria. Therefore; the study objectives were to assess the compliance levels with safe practice, to establish pump attendant’s knowledge and attitude on safe practice and to determine the factors associated with the compliance rate. The study adopted a cross-sectional survey design. Two-stage cluster sampling technique was utilized to select 27 filling stations, of which, 212 petrol pump attendants were interviewed as respondents. Data were collected using an interviewer-administered questionnaire. Descriptive statistics including percentages and frequencies were utilised in summarizing the data. Findings of the study show that the level of compliance with safe practices in terms of fire extinguisher usage (76.9%) and use of PPE (77.8%) was good. However, other safe practices have been neglected. Knowledge was generally good, especially in terms of PPE usage (92%), fire extinguisher (99.1%), and the use of spill kits (64.6%). Pump attendant's also had a positive attitude towards compliance. Inferential analysis revealed that level of education (AOR 3.331, CI 95% 1.771-6.264), work experience (AOR 1.905, CI 95% 1.028-3.529) and attitude (AOR 5.216, CI 95% 1.458- 18.665) are the best predictors for compliance with safe practice. Therefore, the study concludes that pump attendants have a good knowledge and a positive attitude regarding safe practices, but recommends that education and training of pump attendants should be prioritized in order to boost compliance rate which was found to be poor. Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) should enforce the adoption of safety regulations in order to improve compliance by both managers and pump attendants.