Jordan Journal of Civil Engineering, Volume 8, No. 1, 2014 - 81 - © 2014 JUST. All Rights Reserved. The Application of Health and Safety Plan in Nigerian Construction Firms Mansir Dodo Lecturer II, Faculty of Environmental Design, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria E-Mails: mansirdo14@yahoo.com; ibrokb@yahoo.com; abdulsalamdalhatu@yahoo.com ABSTRACT Construction works all over the world pose serious threat to workers and even non-workers. Health and safety in Nigerian construction firms have long been an issue to reckon with due to the several reports of the occurrence of accidents during construction works. This study investigates the extent of application of Health and Safety Plan in construction firms in Nigeria. A purposive sampling technique was used purposely for convenience sake and data was fetched from three cities with equal representation by the aid of a structured questionnaire. Results reveal that even though most firms studied have been in business for over a decade, one quarter of them hardly comply with any Health and Safety Plan during construction. Furthermore, employees are assets but this study reveals that some firms fully in business neither have Health and Safety insurance for their employees nor do some facilitate payment of Health and Safety insurance for their staff. It was concluded that effective Health and Safety practices for employees in Nigeria are yet to be fully appreciated and implemented among construction firms. As such, it is recommended that relevant authorities should checkmate Health and Safety practices in the Nigerian construction industry. KEYWORDS: Employee, Health and Safety Plan, Nigerian construction firms. BACKGROUND Health and Safety is an inevitable aspect of construction due to its nature of being made up of the conglomerations of people from diverse backgrounds and disciplines with each individual`s output determining the level of success to be recorded at each construction stage. According to Mcintosh et al. (2001), construction workers all over the world are three times more likely to be killed and twice as likely to be injured as workers in other occupations. For instance, Hong Kong recorded a total of 3,001 convictions for Health and Safety offences with a total fine of $17million in 1993. Out of this figure, 1,382 convictions with a total fine of $1million were related to construction site alone (Nigeria Tribune, 1997). Furthermore, Baldacconi and Santis (2000) assert that the mortal accidents in the field of the constructions in Italy represent 25 percent of the total of the accidents occurring in industry and services. In the United States of America (USA), National Safety Council (NSC) found that construction injuries accounted for nearly 11percent of all work related injuries and more that 30 percent of all fatalities in 2001 (Eppenberger and Haupt, 2003). In 2005, a four-storey building under construction in Port Harcourt collapsed and not less than twenty workers died in the incident barely 24 hours after a similar incident which occurred in Lagos (The Punch, July 2005). Recognizing the importance of adequate Health and Safety at construction worksites, the European Union enacted the “control of hazard on temporary and mobile Accepted for Publication on 31/10/2013. brought to you by CORE View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk provided by International Institute for Science, Technology and Education (IISTE): E-Journals