VisEra actively communicates and cooperates with customers and suppliers to jointly improve the safety and health performance of the supply chain. We also share safety and health knowledge and experience with external parties and build partnerships with business partners, industries, governments, academia, and the entire society to build a safe and healthy workplace environment together.
The Blue Book for Contractors’ Safety, Health and Environmental Protection was published in 2021 for contractors to enhance their environmental, safety, and health management awareness in all construction operations. Before contractors enter the plant, they must use the construction management system to organize pre-construction safety meetings, construction permit reviews, and completion of safety and health training for all contractor personnel before the access control system permits their entry and implements management and control.
We encourage high-risk contractors to obtain ISO 45001 occupational health and safety management system certification. In 2022, 10 contractors responsible for onsite high-risk operations obtained certification (approximately 80%), and we aim to attain 100% certification by 2030. Contractors are not permitted to perform high-risk operations in plant areas without obtaining comprehensive management system certification. We continue to verify the feasibility of JSA work safety analysis through pre-construction surveys and pre-construction meetings for remaining construction items. We ensure that the contractors have sufficient safety and health enforcement capabilities to complete the contracted work on time in accordance with quality and safety requirements.
We also continue to conduct onsite safety, health, and environmental protection audits for suppliers each year. We require a score of at least 70 and provide support. The contract value is used as the basis for screening and grading for onsite audits. We also require reports on improvements for deficiencies and include them as the criteria for the selection of suppliers and contractors. In 2022, we conducted a total of 11 supplier/contractor audits and identified a 50 deficiencies and recommendations during the audits. There were 42 items related to safety and health, 5 items related to fire safety, and 3 items related to environmental protection, and the completion rate of corrections for deficiencies was 96% (48/50), and continued monitoring will be carried out until the improvement reaches 100% completion.
VisEra organizes annual training for new contractors to inform them of the hazards in accordance with regulations. If a new contractor fails to obtain the certification for the hazard communication training course, the contractor will not be able to apply for the VisEra Qualified Vendor Work Permit and will not be able to apply for permission for related construction projects. If a contractor does not have a contractor’s work permit, the Company will prohibit the entry of its personnel when reviewing the qualifications of the contractor personnel for entry into the plant.
Contractor training results
The Company invests significant amounts of manpower and financial resources each year to increase the safety and health performance of contractors. We reintroduced the contractor safety and health management system in 2022 to improve the efficiency of contractors’ construction management procedures in the plants.
The Company selects contractors with high risk ratings to conduct self-assessments on safety and health every year. We require all contractors to identify mechanical, material, compliance, and environmental risks for the work contents and propose countermeasures during the negotiation and organization meeting. We also require them to conduct environmental, safety, and health audits for the construction project every day. If there are any deficiencies, they must be immediately addressed to effectively reduce the environmental, safety, and health risks.
We implement risk-based management for contractors and established the “High-Risk Operation Management Regulations”, “High-Risk Area Management Regulations”, and “Operation Permit Management Regulations” to require contractors and employees of the Company to work together and ensure safety in construction. In 2022, we improved the functions of contractor construction management system, and recorded high-risk construction audit results and deficiencies in the electronic system to effectively monitor construction safety issues in the plants. We also implemented 100% high-risk audits so that the Company did not have any occupational accident in 464 high-risk operations and 430,296 hours of contractor operations in the plant in 2022.
Operational risk ratings (extract from the VisEra Blue Book)
These measures are implemented to prevent potential significant casualties of high-risk operations, electric shocks of personnel, fire, leaks of hazardous gases/chemicals, and operations that may cause system shutdown or interrupt production. Contractors are required to apply for work permits for high-risk operations in advance. We also implement restrictions on 14 types of hazardous operations (pipeline operations, roofing operations, installation of bus switches, operations in confined spaces, operations of hazardous machinery, construction scaffolding assembly/dismantling operations at a height of over five meters, LDS cylinder replacement operations for pyrophoric substances, ceiling (including mezzanine) operations, wall removal operations, fire operations, fire sensor isolation, fire safety interruptions, organic solvent operations, and activation of electricity supply panel rated 208V or higher). Supervisors and operators must obtain technical certification (obtain a legal license or the little red card) to be qualified for entering the construction site.
High-risk operation and construction management
We require contractors to implement the following tasks to promote contractor self-management and implement occupational safety tasks:
The Company’s personnel shall implement front-end management with pre-operation reviews such as work permits and independent onsite inspections with the contractor’s supervisors. They shall also take measures such as recording violations, deductions, suspension of rights, termination of contract, and request for restoration of damages against the contractor, and impose penalties in accordance with the contract if necessary.
VisEra understands the importance of occupational safety and health for all workers of the Company. We also value and continuously invest resources to create a safe and healthy workplace environment. We planned four major strategies for future improvement with the aim of working with employees and contractors to create a more sustainable work environment.
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