Wednesday, December 07, 2005
The Sir George Earl Award is considered as the highest and most prestigious health and safety award given by the Royal Society for Prevention from Accidents (RoSPA), UK.
Sir George Earl was Chairman of the Cement Manufacturers Union Company in 1954 in Portland. He delivered a speech at the Industrial Safety Conference about the importance of competition, achievement and rewards.
To link words with deeds, he donated an award for annual competition in the areas of health and safety. This award is currently known as the Sir George Earl Award and aims at encouraging outstanding contributions in the fields of health and safety in all economic sectors. The Award involves the following:
a) Sir George Earl Award which is maintained for a period of one year in the Company and then it is given to another company and so on.
b) A commemorative shield to be maintained for life as a record of achievement.
c) Eligibility of the winning enterprise to display the Award slogan on its official correspondence and to raise the Award flag in recognition from RoSPA of the Company's excellence in the areas of occupational health and safety.
GPIC won this year's award in competition with more than 1,400 from all continents and economic sectors. It was compared against all of them and four companies were selected namely Toyota of Japan, General Electric of the US and British Shell Company in addition to GPIC.
When the competition became limited to these four companies, delegates were sent by RoSPA to evaluate such companies in their premises. Then, the four companies were invited to make their presentations before the Judging Panel in RoSPA's office in the UK. The panel consisted of 20 occupational health and safety experts.
GPIC was selected by the Panel to win this year's Trophy because of its consistent safety system in addition to its contributions in service of the Bahrain community and the Middle East to raise the standards of occupational health and safety. This is the first time that this Trophy is won by an organization from outside Europe and the United States.
The key factors for the selection of GPIC by RoSPA to win this award are the following:
1. Its outstanding top level leadership of health and safety.
2. The Company's efforts to synthesizing the best from worldwide health and safety standards to build a truly robust risk management regime.
3. Various steps taken by the Company to involve all members of its workforce in adopting decisions related to health and safety in a transparent and effective manner.
4. The strong focus on off-the-job safety and their efforts to involve employees' families and the wider community in numerous initiatives to raise awareness of health, safety and environmental issues and making them a way of life and part of the social culture.
In addition, the Award Committee expressed its high admiration of the major and positive influence of GPIC in the development of health and safety legislation throughout the Kingdom and its contribution to enriching the health and safety culture and commitment to cultivate such values in the community. The Company was recognized for its remarkable effort to protect the environment and on the development and enhancement of the environment through innovative projects such as the Fish Farm, Bird Sanctuary, landscaping projects such as the Medical Herb Garden in GPIC.
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© Press Release 2005