6th Philippines Railway Summit: Enhancing Railway Safety: Addressing Occupational Hazards with Yokogawa RAP

Despite significant progress in occupational safety and health (OSH) over the years, workers continue to suffer from work-related injuries, with some even losing their lives due to exposure to various occupational hazards and risks. According to the International Labor Organization (ILO), 330,000 people die annually due to workplace accidents, and an estimated 374 million people suffer non-fatal injuries each year. These incidents not only harm workers and their families but also cost the global economy around 4% of GDP due to productivity losses and medical expenses.

 

Common Causes of Workplace Accidents

The main reasons for these incidents include:

• Slips, trips, and falls, including falls from height
• Contact with moving equipment, machinery, or flying/falling objects
• Human factors, such as errors or violations

Approximately 60% of accidents occur due to a lack of or inadequate control of work and poor understanding of the risks involved.

 

Challenges of Paper-Based Permit to Work (PTW) Systems

While paper-based PTW systems may be familiar and straightforward for many customers, they pose various challenges that can lead to safety risks, loss of productivity, and efficiency issues:

1. Accuracy and Consistency in Risk Assessment: Manual inputs increase the likelihood of inconsistent or incomplete information.
2. Time-Consuming Processes: Physical document movement between departments for approvals, updates, and re-approvals can be slow and cause delays, especially in time-critical maintenance work.
3. Missing Real-Time Updates: Updating or modifying permits in real-time is difficult, leading to potential miscommunication.
4. Manual Errors and Inconsistencies: Filling out forms manually can result in errors such as incomplete information, illegible handwriting, or incorrect data entries.
5. Missing Real-Time Updates: Updating or modifying permits in real-time is difficult, leading to potential miscommunication.
6. Integration Challenges: Paper-based systems do not integrate well with other workplace management systems.
7. Scalability Limitations: Managing risk assessments becomes increasingly complex and inefficient as operations scale up.
8. Difficulty in Tracking and Auditing: Tracking the status or history of a permit can be cumbersome, making audits and compliance verification time-consuming.

 

Yokogawa RAP: A Modern Solution

Yokogawa RAP offers a fresh, intelligent alternative to digitizing paper-based systems, addressing the above challenges effectively. It puts risk assessment at the forefront of the permitting process, incorporating a knowledge base of potential hazards and mitigating controls. Its unique icon-based design ensures that all rules and controls are easily applied, and its wide range of configurations adapts to any workflow, providing safe and cost-efficient control of work.

 

Key features of Yokogawa RAP include:

• Highly configurable to work with individual customer work processes without prior knowledge of permits/permitting systems.
• Modular system offering integration with key systems such as CMMS.
• Tablet compliant with on-demand dashboards and remote work capabilities.
• Supports multiple languages, enabling seamless adoption across global operations.

 

 

 

The Philippine railway system is currently undergoing significant modernization, though it faces challenges in terms of infrastructure quality and network expansion. Significant investments are underway, with the 2024 budget for infrastructure set to double from PHP106B in 2023 to PHP214.3B, with over 76% allocated to developing new and existing railways.

Recent years have seen a recovery in rail passenger numbers, with notable annual growth reaching 379 million riders by 2017. This growth has been driven by increased patronage in key rail lines, supported by extended train travel times and a rise in the number of trips, signaling a positive trend in the country’s rail transport development.

 

Conclusion

Digital Control of Work (DCoW) is a transformative approach that enhances safety, operational efficiency, and risk management. Its applicability across various stages of lifecycle—Construction, operation and maintenance, and —ensures consistent safety standards, streamlined workflows and reduces human errors. Its universal framework supports multiple languages, ensuring effective communication for multilingual teams and seamless adoption across global operations for diverse industries including railways. By addressing the challenges of traditional paper-based systems, Yokogawa RAP enhances railway safety, making it a crucial tool in the ongoing efforts to modernize and expand railway infrastructure.

 

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