The Impact of Regulation on Occupational Safety – A Regional Study for Italian Food Industry

Abstract

This paper analyses the impact of the most recent Italian safety national regulation (Dlgs. 81/08) on the occupational accidents frequency and severity in Food and Drink Industry. Food and Drink Industry (FDI) is a branch of manufacturing sector with a relevant role in European Union and Italian economy. Far away from the common way of thinking, the FDI sector has an accident frequency comparable to those of other manufacturing sectors. The occupational accidents analysed were more than 6000, all occurred in Piemonte, a north west region of Italy, from 2006 to 2013. The study was carried out analysing the relationships between occupational accidents trend and macro-economic variables concerning the degree of employment, the worked hours and working force distribution. Furthermore a specific focus was done on evolution of the occupational accidents dynamic with the using of an innovative clustering method named SKM (S.O.M & K-Mean method). This study identified as relevant factor in the occupational accidents reduction the effects of economical crisis expressed in term of smaller number of worked hours. Results showed that big companies reported a bigger reduction of occupational accidents than small and micro enterprises.