The Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) has been awarded a $103,854 Susan Harwood Grant by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration
(OSHA) to develop comprehensive training materials pertaining to the draft ergonomics guidelines recently released for the poultry processing
industry.
The planned effort, coordinated in conjunction with the National Chicken Council (NCC), the National Turkey Federation (NTF), and the U.S.
Poultry & Egg Association (USPOULTRY), will focus on developing new written and video training materials related to the guidelines and the assessment
of hazard recognition, evaluation, and control; conducting training-the-trainer courses in three different regions of the country; and conducting
limited workforce training sessions at several plant locations.
A coordinating committee is being assembled by the NCC and NTF to advise the GTRI team on course content needs. In addition, USPOULTRY has
committed an additional $20,000 in matching funds to help extend the support focused on video course materials development and their delivery on
the Web.
“We consider this an investment in our industry’s future and look forward to working with Georgia Tech on this very worthwhile endeavor,” said
USPOULTRY President Don Dalton.
This year OSHA awarded more than $11.2 million in grants to 67 nonprofit organizations for safety and health training and educational programs.
These grants support classroom quality training programs that can be published and used by other organizations, training for OSHA’s industry-specific
ergonomics guidelines, and training for targeted safety and health hazards, including workplace violence and small-business safety and health
management systems. The training grants are named in honor of the late Susan Harwood, a former director of the Office of Risk Assessment in OSHA’s
Health Standards Directorate, who died in 1996. During her 17-year tenure with the agency, Harwood helped develop OSHA standards to protect workers
exposed to bloodborne pathogens, cotton dust, benzene, formaldehyde, asbestos, and lead in construction.
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