Hassan Boukacem

Poster is the mean of sensibilisation most used on the worksites, because it’s easy to carry, to exhibit, and to understand.

The posters of the Organisation for Working Environment Safety and Health of the construction industry in Algeria (OPREBATP) are issued by the Information Department in collaboration with Technical Department. Following the exhibition on the work sites, the only feed-back is the number of posters distributed, but no information concerning the efficiency of this visual support towards the users (i.e. the workers) is available. Consequently, it was decided to do a survey in order to elaborate a new approach taking in account the remarks and suggestions coming from the workers.

It’s the questionnaire, classical mean of investigation which has been chosen. The random sample is composed by Enterprises located in regions regularly visited by OPREBATP’s Safety Delegates.

Over random sample of 326 enterprises, we have got:

235 Private Enterprises (72 %)

86 Public Enterprises (26%)

5 Non defined (2%)

The number of Private Enterprises is three times bigger than Public Enterprises. Therefore, safety delegates have worked more in the private sector. Among labour categories interrogated, engineers and managers represent the majority of the sample (48%) followed by specialised workers (27%) and employees (22%). They have a professional experience from 5 to 20 years.

• 277 persons out of 326 (85%) say
  that they receive regularly
  OPREBATP-Posters.
  
• Over these 277 persons, 219 (67%) found a great interest in reading the posters. 52 persons (16%) found them to be of little interest and 6 (2%) of no interest.
  
• 261 persons (80,%) think that the message displayed by the posters is easy to understand, and 14 (4%) that it is difficult to understand.
  
• 136 persons (42%) think that the messages displayed by posters have a direct relation with the occupational hazards. 137 persons interrogated (42%) answered that the messages displayed by posters have sometimes a direct relation with occupational hazards.
  
• 215 persons (66%) discuss and comment the Posters with their workmates, whereas 61 (19%) don’t do it.

1. The message displayed by posters has not always a direct relation with professional hazards. This can be explained by the fact that a poster deals only with a unic and definite issue. Therefore it’s necessary to target workers concerned in order to display the right poster for the right hazard.
   
2. The posters should be tested by the workers and their remarks should be considered, before production and distribution.