Alcoholic and soft drinks

Injury rate comparisons

Injury incidence rates (ie injuries per 100,000 workers per year) averaged for the three years 2005/06-2007/08 are as follows:

There are around 30 different food and drink manufacturing industries. View a comparison graph of all injuries.

Manual handling and lifting - especially barrels, casks and crates
Slips and trips - half the injuries are from slips (90% on wet floors) and half from trips
Being struck by falling objects, eg barrels, boxes, equipment
Falls from height - off ladders, work platforms, stairs and from vehicles
Machinery - mainly conveyors but also bottling machines, packaging machines, palletisers etc
Exposure to harmful substances - cleaning chemicals, hot liquids
Transport - especially lift trucks

Musculoskeletal injury from heavy manual handling, eg of casks, kegs, crates, sacks and items of plant
Work-related upper limb disorders (WRULDs) from repetitive handling, eg in bottling halls
Noise induced hearing loss from noisy plant, eg casking/kegging, decrating/washing, bottling, canning and packaging machinery
Occupational lung disease from exposure to grain and malt dust
Occupational lung disease and nasal cancer from exposure to hardwood dust in coopperages

Grain dust - Guidance Note EH66
Moving food and drink - Manual handling solutions
Manual handling in the brewing industry - Guidance Note
Brewers and Licensed Retailers Association (now British Beer & Pub Association), Market Towers, 1 Nine Elms Lane, London SW8 5NQ
A wide range of whisky manufacture health and safety publications, videos and interactive training packages are available from:
The Scotch Whisky Association
20 Atholl Crescent
Edinburgh EH3 8HF