Areas of non-existent workplace safety

Workplace safety has long been a matter of serious concern but recent developments suggest that the situation has further deteriorated. Accidents and deaths arising from hazardous working conditions and compounded by persistent negligence in enforcing safety standards have cast a long shadow over the country's labour landscape. What should be places of livelihood have, for many, become sites of risk and loss. The just-concluded calendar year presents a particularly troubling picture. At least 1,190 workers lost their lives and 222 were injured in job-related accidents countrywide, according to a report released last week. This represents a sharp increase from 2024, when 905 workers died and 218 were injured. An additional 285 fatalities in a single year is not a statistical anomaly; it is a stark indication of deep, unresolved failures in workplace safety governance.

These findings come from the annual monitoring report of the Bangladesh Occupational Safety, Health and Environment (OSHE) Foundation, which compiles data from national and local newspapers, electronic and online media, trade union sources, and verified field-level investigations. One of the most unsettling revelations is the fatality rate itself: more than eight out of every ten reported workplace accidents in 2025 ended in death. Such a figure forces an uncomfortable reflection-when accidents occur, workers often do not survive. Weak preventive measures, delayed rescue operations, and limited access to timely medical care appear to turn many incidents into irreversible tragedies. The report also reveals that the burden of these accidents falls disproportionately on the informal sector. Around 84 per cent of workplace accidents occurred in jobs that lie outside effective labour law coverage. The OSHE Foundation rightly identifies this as the single most critical structural barrier to improving workplace safety. As long as informal workers remain beyond the reach of enforcement mechanisms and social protection schemes, meaningful progress will remain elusive.

Occupations involving long working hours, heavy machinery, constant mobility and informal arrangements were found to be especially hazardous. Road accidents accounted for the largest share of workplace deaths, followed by electrocution, falls from height, fires and explosions, lightning strikes and incidents involving violence or harassment. Troublingly, the report notes that most of these incidents could have been prevented through basic safety planning, supervision and enforcement. Strengthening labour inspections, establishing workplace safety committees with worker participation, ensuring compensation for bereaved families, conducting regular safety audits in high-risk sectors, creating a government-run national database on workplace accidents and extending social protection to informal workers are practical steps to address the situation. 

Containing the peril of workplace accidents, particularly in the informal manufacturing and transport sectors, must be treated as a national priority. While the government has designated agencies tasked with this responsibility, the worsening situation reflects a troubling gap between institutional presence and actual effectiveness. It is time for the state to move beyond formal commitments and ensure that safe working conditions are not a privilege, but a guaranteed right for all workers, across every vulnerable sector.