Introduction
There were 177,012 enterprises operating in Indonesia in
2007. Only an estimated 15 per cent of them had received
some form of technical OSH assistance. However, of
those that received assistance, only about 20 per cent were
classified as micro, small or medium enterprises (MSMEs).
Yet, MSMEs employ some 87.4 per cent of Indonesia's
workforce. Because of their size, they experience many
challenges to implementing good OSH practices. Hence,
it is important to examine the OSH conditions in
MSMEs to clearly understand their needs.
The National Safety and Health Centre embarked on
a research programme to examine the OSH conditions
in the MSMEs in 15 regions in order to develop
programmes to assist small companies in raising their
OSH standards.
Research on the workplace conditions in
MSMEs
The research programme focused on monitoring the
level of exposure to certain types of hazards among 6,000
workers, such as:
• noise levels
• dust exposure
• ergonomic hazards
• chemical hazards
• vibration hazards
• heat stress.