The Head of the Civil Service of the Federation (HOCSF), Folasade Yemi-Esan, has charged heads of ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) to prioritise a healthy working environment for their staff to enhance service delivery.

Ms Yemi- Esan made the call on Tuesday in Abuja at the opening of a three-day training on ‘Occupational Safety And Health (OSH) Desk Officers in MDAs’ where she was represented by Mahmud Kambari, the permanent secretary service welfare office, office of the HOCSF.

The training, which attracted over 170 civil servants selected from different MDAs was themed “Fostering a Safe Conducive and Healthy Work Environment for Civil Servants”.

The initiative aimed at showing the government’s concern for the safety and health of civil servants, generally for better and greater productivity of the service.

Ms Yemi-Esan explained that a healthy workforce was a key element that could translate to increased productivity in any organisation, hence the need for such officers in the public sector.

She recalled the National Occupational Safety and Health’s (NOSH) policy, which was approved by the federal executive council and mandated by the office of the HOCSF to ensure the provision of a safe and conducive work environment.

The initiative was aimed at ensuring a healthy work environment and promoting international best practices in OSH for workers in all government MDAs.

“In line with this mandate, the office of the HOCSF on July 6, 2022, issued a circular for the establishment of OSH Desk in MDAs, instructing them to establish or resuscitate an OSH Desk. The office is to be manned by staff who will be trained to discharge the responsibilities of coordinating the implementation of OSH activities in the MDAs,” she explained.

Earlier, Comfort Adeosun, the director operational health and safety in the office of the HOCSF, said the training was aimed to equip the participants to function properly as desk officers and to properly drive the OSH.

According to Ms Adeosun, OSH is an organisational policy developed by the federal government to promote healthy living amongst civil servants in the course of discharging their duties.

Also, Oluwakemi Lawanson, managing director for MODZ.UK Solution Limited and a guest lecturer, who spoke on the topic “health and safety at the office”, decried the high rate of death being recorded among civil servants owing to lack of precautionary ways.

Ms Lawanson urged the desk officers on training to make deliberate efforts to prevent workplace accidents and illness so as to promote healthy well-being among civil servants.

According to her, it is expected that at the end of the three-day training, the participants would go home with an understanding of what safety and health are at the workplace because if they don’t understand, it will be difficult to achieve the needed aims of the initiative.

(NAN)