25kg is only a guide. Whether or not people can lift that will depend on numerous factors. i.e Height of the person, gender, (are they pregnant), general health of the person, how far they have to carry the item, the environment they are in etc. You will need to complete a Manual Handling risk assessmnet using, may I suggest, PETER' (Person, Environment, Task, Equipment, (available), Record). Firstly Is there a need for anyone to lift the bag? Can you use lifting equipment? Remember the costs of accident to your company when assessing the risk of someone being injured whilst lifting so it may be cheaper in the long run to use lifting equipment rather that getting a person to lift the bags.

Bladon, Would you consider the reasoning of 'reasonably practical' to looking at manual handling aid to remove/reduce the risks related to lifting these bags at the rate of 1 per hour .. or so? SP has also touched on a RP approach with use of 2 people!

Bladon, I presume you cant go for smaller bags, 2 person lift etc all the obvious things in RA process! Have a look at this link to vacuum lifting aid for similar bags in pharmaceutical industry http://in.schmalz.com/anwendungen/01243/ Avoids any significant manual handling (watch video looks so simple you can lift one-handed!) and may remove need for other manual handling aids if installed throughout the workplace at key points Also called Unimove system in USA - might be expensive but pay back through increased throughput/productivity, less injuries etc

I thought the construction industry reduced the sack size to 25Kg so you could get one under each arm? Seriously though, most comments seem to point to the same conclusion: if challenged, could you say, hand on heart, that you have looked at sack trucks/conveyors/vacuum lifters/etc... and found good engineering reasons to reject them all? That's what you will need if there's a claim. By the way, it's well worth looking at vacuum lifters; if they can be made to work on sites lifting paving slabs then they are past the "nice idea but..." stage. I've found it helpful to sit down with a Slingsbys catalogue (or K&K or... other industrial products catalogues are available) and the people actually involved as a sort of brainstorming session. It's surprising what can come out and is a great bit of worker involvement. And I'm not even an ergonomist! Jim

Hi, Has there been an incident, near-miss or report from OHP that suggests there is a problem? Perhaps at this time you have reduced risks to ALARP. Keep monitoring and engage with the workforce on this - they will be of more use than us lot! GC

SP. Only trying to help! Les

Let try posting again. I am also in the plastic industry and we have our raw material delivered in 25kg sacks, we have between 24 -30 tons of material delivered each month. There is nothing we can do to change the way it is delivered or packed and sadly that is just the way they do it so will not change. We have all delivers dropped in the car park and have a team of staff who split the weight to 1/2 ton and stack height which with mechanical aids make it much easier for staff to move. We have done risk assessments and training, but we do not have the space for all the over head gantry style equipment and it would be useless in the car park, so we monitor the staff and have weekly reminders about safe lifting. I am pleased to say in the 10 years I have been working here we have not had any issues. We tend not to use female staff split the loads but that is based in height our staff are petite but if asked they are happy to help. I think a lot of this is common sense and good communication with your staff on their ideas and abilities to do the job. .

Thank you to all your responses to my Issue. We have completed manual handling assessments and have implemented the lean manufacturing principles in the area. All our staff have had manual handling training and we are now implementing monthly toolbox talks for our employees. We have looked at feeding the large use pigments directly into our colour room , but TIO2 is difficult to feed via a vacumat . We have looked at the regular catalogues and hi lift pump with a stair climber would help , but not resolve the issue. We visited a Palamatic Customer for air suction lifting yesterday and for the 18 bags a day an investment in £6000 is difficult to justify in these harsh economic times. We do use external Silo feeds for our main PVC supplies into our mixers. We will ask the question to our TIO2 supplier for reducing down to 10kg bags , but as Tarasafety stated any change in bags size will increase the number of bags used , the packaging as well as the cost of the raw material . The two person lift option will be investigated , but based upon existing manning will be difficult. As a temporary measure we have instructed our operators to provide 25kg bags to our colourist ( female) on a regular basis. Thank you for all your responses , which I have found very useful.