Abstract

This paper attempts to investigate the influence of lean thinking on occupational safety and health problems improvement in manufacturing industries and it also to show how occupational safety and health severely hurts manufacturing industries productivity. Nowadays, developing countries are focused on Technology Transfer and be engaged in developing their manufacturing industries so as to compete globally and for their economic growth. While expanding the development of their manufacturing industries, they are also importing new technologies with which they are not familiar and furthermore, neglecting workplace safety and health hazards impact on productivity and workers well-being. Due to these reasons, much productive working time is lost and high costs have been incurred. To highlight the impact of lean on workplace safety and health, this study was conducted by reviewing recent state-of-the-art literature and taking into consideration secondary data records from Ethiopian Ministry of Labor and Social Affair (MOLSA) for simple illustrative example. Findings from the literatures showed that there is less attention and consideration of lean workplace safety and health in manufacturing industries.