MBA NORTH NAMES REGIONAL CONSTRUCTION SITE SAFETY WINNERS

The Master Builders Association (MBA) North is pleased to announce the winners of this year’s Regional Safety Competition. This annual competition is a collaboration between MBA North and the competition sponsor, Federated Employers Mutual Assurance Company (FEM), and aims to recognise companies setting the benchmark in safety on construction sites.

Gerhard Roets, Construction Health & Safety Manager at MBA North says, “Safety is a very important topic in the construction industry – the industry employs many people and the work is intrinsically dangerous. We interact with construction companies who are affected by workplace accidents, and we strongly advocate for building a safety culture to prevent such accidents. Initiatives like the MBA North Regional Safety Competition play a big role in keeping the need to follow safety best practice to the forefront.”

During 2023, FEM recorded 48 fatal accidents, with motor vehicle accidents accounting for twenty-one of those, while ten were in the “struck by” category. Other categories registering fatalities were “fall on to different levels” (9) and “caught in, on, between” (2). Accidents resulting in permanent disabilities (not resulting in pension) totalled 572, while only nineteen permanent disabilities resulting in pension occurred. In total, there were 5 986 accidents, causing 38 255 lost days.

These figures represent a slight increase from 2022, when there were 45 fatalities, 5 797 accidents and 40 137 lost days. The figures for 2021 were 56 fatalities from 6 423 accidents.

“Slowly but surely we are making construction sites safer, with huge benefits for workers and employers alike,” says Roets.

The 2024 MBA North Regional Safety Competition attracted entries from 60 contractors and 7 subcontractors – a decrease of 11 on the 2023 competition. Roets says this could be due to the fact that many construction companies were liquidated or went into business rescue in the past few years. A sign of hope, though, is that the total project value represented by the entries this year was more than R13.3 billion, an increase on last year’s project value of R10.6 billion.

The winners announced by MBA North are:

Category A – Plant & Storage Yards: Tiber Construction – Village Deep Yard

Category B1 – Allied Trades: Form-Scaff – Nelspruit

Category B2 – Manufacturers: WBHO Construction – Signage Manufacturing

Category C – Less than R15m: Concor Construction – Menlyn Mall Taxi Facilities

Category D – R15m to R40m: Enza Construction – Africa Data Centre, ADC 2.5

Category E – R40m to R100m: Tri-Star Construction (Pty) Ltd – China Shopping Centre, Crown City

Category F – R100m to R250m: GVK-Siya Zama Building Contractors Gauteng – Bertrams Multipurpose Centre

Category G – R250m to R450m: WBHO/Trencon JV – Barlow Park Residential Phase 2

Category H – R450m to R750m: WBHO Construction – Teraco JB5

Category I – R750m plus: GVK-Siya Zama Building Contractors Gauteng – Soshanguve Plaza Redevelopment

Best Sub Contractor: Formacon – China Shopping Centre, Crown City

Best Performing Health & Safety Client Agent – Stephen Friend

Best Performing Construction Manager – Pieter Du Plessis

Best Performing Health & Safety Manager – Thando Mbhele

Best Performing Health & Safety Officer – Sydwell Mabasa

Best Performing Construction Supervisor – Johan Scholtz

Best Performing Yard Manger – Pardon Dube

Best Performing Health & Safety Representative – Portia Maimela

“All category winners will now automatically advance into the Master Builders South Africa’s National Safety Awards, which will be announced at the organisation’s annual conference,” says Roets. “We wish them well as they compete against the country’s best.”