Health and safety

The health and safety of our employees is one of our primary responsibilities. As such, we work particularly hard to make continuous improvements.

Note: The performance data in this section covers 86% of our employees. The remaining 14% work in functions and locations unrelated to manufacturing.

Disclosure on management approach

STHS5

We manage our health and safety performance using OHSAS 18001, which is widely seen as the most rigorous international standard for occupational health and safety. We extended the OHSAS 18001 certification program to all 16 of our manufacturing sites following a target set in 2001, and achieved in 2003. Four non-manufacturing sites are also certified.

LA5

Effective performance monitoring means recording work-related injuries and illnesses, and calculating related indices. We have adopted the OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration in the United States) model. Indices are appropriate for benchmarking within the microelectronics industry. The OSHA model meets the requirements of the International Labor Organization (ILO) Code of Practice.

LA6

In 2005, to concentrate our efforts, we merged the three steering committees for Environment, Health and Safety, and Hazardous Materials into one joint Corporate EHS Steering Committee. Each manufacturing site also has a Health and Safety Steering Committee. Permanent members include the Site Manager, Site Safety Officer, Operation Manager(s), HR Manager, Materials/Purchasing Manager, and Facilities Manager. This Committee is responsible for implementing corporate health and safety policy. Each local Health and Safety Steering Committee covers all employees based at its site. Some 86% of our employees are covered by these committees – the remaining 14% of employees are in functions and locations unrelated to manufacturing.

See our website for more information on our management approach.

Health and safety performance data for 2005

LA7; STHS3, STHS4: §9.1; 9.3 of Decalogue

In 2005, there were no work-related fatalities within ST, and no health and safety fines or penalties within any of our manufacturing sites or our major non-manufacturing sites.

LA7, STHS3, STHS4: Approximate man hours worked (millions) since last recordable case of injury or illness
	2005
Shenzhen (China)	11
Muar (Malaysia)	8
Ain Sebaa (Morocco)	7
Bouskoura back-end (Morocco)	3
Bouskoura SPG (Morocco)	4
Phoenix (USA)	2*

Ang Mo Kio (Singapore) received Silver and Merit Safety Awards from the Ministry of Manpower for its safety performance.

STHS1: Recordable cases rate
	ST's recordable cases rate for work-related injuries and illnesses decreased by 30% in 2005 compared with 2004. 2005 recordable cases rate = 0.51 recordable injury/illness case per 100 employees. ST record low for RC rate

	2002	2003	2004	2005
Recordable cases rate	0.93	0.78	0.74	0.51

STHS2: Severity rate
	ST's severity rate for workrelated injuries and illnesses increased by 10% in 2005 compared with 2004. 2005 severity rate = 8.7 days lost due to injury/illness per 100 employee days.*

	2002	2003	2004	2005
Severity rate	15.7	11.0	7.9	8.7

The apparent deterioration of the severity rate figure was mainly caused by some anomalous peaks at two sites in the second quarter of 2005. Actions were immediately taken and a behavioral risk improvement process was put in place. The severity rate then returned to its natural improvement trend with 6.5 days lost per 100 employees during the fourth quarter (compared with 7.9 in 2004).

Recordable cases rate benchmarks
	This chart shows ST's recordable cases rate compared to US manufacturing and US semiconductor manufacturing recordable cases rate. The source of data* is the US Bureau of Labour Statistics (BLS) and the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) respectively.

2004 US Manufacturing (Source: BLS)	6.6
2004 All US semiconductor (Source: BLS)	1.8
2004 SIA OHS	0.93
2005 ST	0.51

STHS6

This ST indicator evaluates the direct and indirect cost of injuries and illnesses. This includes direct wage costs, medical costs, indirect wage costs, administrative costs, material losses/damages costs, production costs, and other hidden costs. The chart below shows the results of this evaluation.

STHS6: Injuries/illnesses cost	US$m

ST's work-related injuries and illnesses cost increased by 14% in 2005 compared with 2004.

	2002	2003	2004	2005
US$m	6.4	4.7	3.7	4.2

STHS7: Distribution of 2005 training hours	%
Emergency (fire fighting, first aid), fire prevention	34
General safety	20
Chemicals (use and handling)	19
Electricity	16
Other health and safety	5
OH&S Management System	3
Ergonomic and handling	2
Fork-lift truck	1

ST's overall safety performance 2002-2005
We have achieved: A reduction of 45% in our recordable cases rate in three years (2005 recordable cases rate was 0.51 compared with 0.93 in 2002) A cut of 44% in our severity rate in three years (2005 severity rate was 8.7 compared with 15.7 in 2002) A decrease of more than 34% in injuries and illnesses cost in three years (2005 cost was US$4.2m, compared with US$6.4m in 2002).

Loss prevention

For information on our loss prevention policy and strategy, see our website.

Chemicals management and workstation risk assessment

STEV67, STEV68

We aim to follow the most stringent regulated health and safety programs at all our locations.

In 2005, we carried out an assessment of all workstations and chemicals in use following strict EHS guidelines. Of more than 20,000 workstations assessed, 1,400 (7%) were identified as falling into the category defined by ST as 'significant' risk (this internal standard is more stringent than any local legislation) and they had dedicated action plans and investment allocated to them. As a result, only 658 cases of 'significant risk' remained in the last quarter of 2005, compared with a target of 700. Our objective is to reach zero cases by the end of 2006.

For more examples of our management of chemicals see our website.

Health and safety goals for 2006

We are determined to continuously improve our health and safety performance. Our goal for 2006 is to reduce recordable cases and severity rates by 10% as already published in our EHS Decalogue. In 2006, we will complete all the remaining actions linked to the chemical risk assessment.