Health and Safety

Kubota formulated its Basic Policies on Safety and Health in April 2013 for the purpose of creating a safer and more secure workplace. Based on these policies, Kubota is enforcing the ethic whereby all people involved in the business, including contractor employees, behave based on the philosophy that “Safety is Our First Priority.”
In addition, three specific instructions to ensure the “Safety is Our First Priority” philosophy were announced by the President.
The Kubota Group’s Mid-term Plan sets out a variety of strategies aiming to achieve a goal of zero Class-A incidents^*, centered on promoting inherently safe equipment, ensuring safe operations, and enhancing human resources development to support safety.

• Class-A incident is one that can lead to a serious incident, such as crushing or entanglement in machinery, due to one of the following causes:
  1) contact with a high-heat object, etc., 2) contact with a heavy load, etc., 3) entrapment and entanglement by machines, 4) fall from heights, 5) contact and the like with forklift / vehicle, 6) falling from or contact with agricultural/construction machinery, 7) electric shock, 8) hit by a flying / falling object, 9) acute poisoning by harmful substances, or 10) fires or explosions

Kubota is mainly addressing the following tasks, with the target of FY2022 completion.

Kubota implemented the following initiatives in FY2020.

1. Achievement of Level II for existing equipment and Level III for new equipment (6 domestic Group companies and 16 overseas Group companies)
   Based on a newly formulated 5-year implementation plan, we are progressing with activities to upgrade to Level II all existing equipment still below that level under the Safety Control Guidelines for assessment and promotion of inherently safe equipment, which categorizes equipment into degrees of safety from Level I to IV. For new equipment, our policy is to ensure safety Level III at the time of its introduction, based on the machinery safety risk assessment guidelines that was revised in FY2017.
2. The habit of visualizing abnormalities and shutting off energy supplies (all domestic Group companies)
   Kubota is instilling in employees the habit of visualizing abnormalities that occur in equipment, tools, or materials, and completely shutting off energy supplies before approaching any hazard, as well as working to prevent the recurrence of equipment abnormalities.
3. Promotion of risk assessments of work operation activities (all domestic Group companies)
   We have revised our risk assessment for work operations with the aims of enhancing the ability to identify risk at worksite and plant departments and promoting measures against residual risk. Through training using the risk assessment, we are working to eliminate any areas of unidentified risk linked to Class-A incidents.
4. Initiatives to instill the Basic Guidelines for Safety-Aware Employees (all domestic Group companies)
   We undertake educational activities via the serial publication of messages from the management in our company newsletters, so that it will become a habit for all of our employees to always abide by the Basic Guidelines for Safety-Aware Employees, and that habituation will help achieve our organizational culture.
5. Education on how to teach safe operations (all domestic Group companies)
   Kubota has established a method of teaching safe operations that clearly specifies approaches to work-related teaching and the means of confirming and assessing degrees of proficiency, thus offering workers easy-to-understand guidance regarding the work they are in charge of and how to perform their work while avoiding hazards. Through e-learning initiatives, group leaders from manufacturing floors learn how to work more safely, having understood the rationale behind the need to abide by safety guidelines.
6. Maintaining and improving a safe and healthy working environment (all domestic Group companies)
   We carry out measurements twice a year at all worksites to continuously monitor conditions at a detailed level. By actively promoting horizontal rollout of example of good practice, we work to maintain and improve standards Group-wide.

Kubota has clearly set the target below for FY2021, and is promoting Company-wide efforts to create safe workplaces.

We provide safety education through messages issued by management and through a range of conferences.

1. Education through management messages
   Messages from management (executive officers) around the themes of the Kubota Group Approach to Safety and Safety-Aware Employees* were distributed via the company newsletter and the company Intranet to promote safety awareness throughout the organization.
   • Kubota Group Guidelines for Safety-Aware Employees/Basic Guidelines for Safety-Aware Employees
2. Education through conferences
   In light of concerns about COVID-19 infection, various conferences were held remotely in FY2020.
   In Japan, Kubota held a gathering of safety and health managers from manufacturing sites and plant departments in November to review efforts to achieve the Mid-term Plan target and to formulate guidelines for the following fiscal year.
   Also in November, the Construction Safety and Health Manager Conference was held for managers to deliberate on the wider roll-out of initiatives to prevent recurrence after a Class-A incident and on safety and health guidelines for the following fiscal year, as well as to share information on revisions to relevant laws.
   Safety and health and environmental initiatives have gained momentum in various regions overseas as well. Although some events were canceled due to COVID-19 concerns, exchanges were held between Group companies in Thailand (2 times online and 5 times in-person among local participants) while Group companies in China conducted mutual site visits (2 times). In North America, a Safety, Health and Environmental Manager Conference, first organized by regional Group companies in FY2019, was held twice online in FY2020. In these ways, regionally organized activities are further expanding.
3. Safety education initiatives
   Due to COVID-19 concerns, safety and health education, particularly for new employees but also for personnel of all ranks, was conducted online in FY2020. We devised new learning methods, such as group work using online tools that enable joint editing in real time.
4. Mutual site visits
   Kubota conducted safety and health “cross patrols” (mutual site visits) to promote exchanges between worksites in different operational areas, gaining awareness of risks by fresh exposure to other worksite environments, sharing examples of good practices, and encouraging their application in future safety and health activities.
   Sharing not just good practices but also the concerns of each worksite led to an opportunity to exchange opinions such as hints for problem-solving and ideas and gain new perspective.

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  Lectures on safety education held online for domestic bases

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  Lectures on safety education held online for overseas bases

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  Mutual site visit (October 14, 2020). Such exchanges between worksites in different operational areas provided an opportunity to be exposed to good practices and gain new awareness.

• Lost Time Incident Rate (Kubota Corporation)

  

• Severity Injury Rate (Kubota Corporation)

  

With the collaboration of specialist international medical treatment and security companies, the Kubota Group is working to reduce risk for employees posted overseas and their accompanying family members and for employees on business trips overseas.
By collecting and analyzing security information at the overseas location, we provide information to Group employees in Japan and overseas. To deal with medical needs, we have rolled out a system operating round the clock every day of the year that provides services including consultation with a doctor by telephone from overseas and arrangement of emergency medical transport.