Occupational health and safety
Occupational safety
Numerous preventive measures and guidelines are in place to ensure that staff from both HHLA and external companies, customers, suppliers and visitors do not come to bodily harm, which is a key concern for HHLA.
HHLA uses modern technologies to achieve constant improvements in occupational safety: for example, a software-based occupational safety management system is used to monitor all targets and measures and a greater focus is put on e-learning systems.
In order to strengthen the perception of occupational safety as a management task, a pilot project was launched during the reporting period to raise safety awareness and develop a behavioural safety culture at one of the Hamburg container terminals. In workshops, managers are trained how to show appreciation and recognition in order to actively integrate occupational safety into management practices and communication with employees. The aim is to sustainably reduce lost working days and the number of accidents at work.
Regular occupational safety campaigns dealing with topics such as fire prevention, hazardous substances and ergonomics continue to be carried out at the HHLA company sites. In order to compile meaningful accident statistics, accidents at all HHLA companies in Hamburg are taken into account and recorded using a standardised reporting system. These also include accidents not directly linked to container handling (e.g. in workshops). The reasons for changes or fluctuations are carefully analysed in order to quickly initiate structured preventive measures.
In 2020, there were 79 notifiable accidents (excluding accidents when commuting) at the companies in Hamburg in which HHLA owns a stake of over 50 % (previous year: 77). This represents an increase of 2.6 %.
Occupational health
As part of its health promotion efforts, HHLA strives to develop a workable occupational health management system which reflects everyday needs and to systematically integrate these measures into company processes.
Furthermore, with the aid of targeted communication and information strategies, HHLA actively promotes existing health care services, such as social counselling and flu vaccinations. This has led to increased awareness of these services among employees.
In addition, the coronavirus pandemic posed particular challenges for HHLA’s occupational safety strategy in 2020. In order to address this, a coronavirus crisis team was established under the leadership of the Executive Board with a coronavirus task force based at the management holding company. Their jointly developed hygiene concept includes, for example, classic social distancing and hygiene regulations, mandatory mask-wearing and a one-way system on all access routes at HHLA. Cleaning intervals were also increased and cleaning materials were provided in the case of hot desking.
Furthermore, measures were adopted that were tailored to the specific characteristics of the different working environments at HHLA. In order to keep the number of contacts to a minimum, the concept for blue-collar activities, for example, ensured that there were no more shift overlaps and that employees worked in fixed groups and smaller teams than before. In addition, quarantine managers were installed at all sites in Germany to conduct contact tracing quickly and directly in the event of an infection.
The rules regarding working from home put in place in late 2019, and thus before the start of the coronavirus pandemic, served as a basis for quickly and consistently implementing further remote working regulations during the pandemic.
As a result of the swift and consistent implementation of coronavirus measures, beyond the legal requirements, the incidence of infections at all HHLA divisions in Germany was kept to a minimum and HHLA’s facilities remained fully operational throughout both lockdowns. This underlines the efficacy of the package of measures.
The coronavirus task force also worked with the Group works council to define rules regarding the timing of time-off entitlements in order to be able to assign time off during quieter operational phases. In addition to the rules regarding working from home, multi-shift work was also made possible in administrative areas such as the management holding company.