Transcription of Feed & Grain Chat with Jim Seibert, Director, Safety, Education & Training, National Grain and Feed Association
Elise Schafer, editor of Feed & Grain: Hi and welcome to Feed & Grain Chat. I'm your host Elise Schafer, editor of Feed & Grain.
This edition of Feed & Grain Chat is brought to you by WATT Global Media and feedandgrain.com. FeedandGrain.com
is your source for the latest news, product and equipment information for the grain handling and feed manufacturing industries.
Today I'm joined on Zoom by Jim Seibert, Director, Safety, Education & Training for the National Grain and Feed Association. He's here today to discuss Stand Up 4 Grain Safety Week being held April 4-8, 2022. So let's get started. Hi, Jim, how are you?
Jim Seibert, director, Safety, Education & Training, NGFA: I'm doing well. Elise, how are you doing?
Schafer: Thank you for coming on today. Now, before we get into the details about this year’s Stand Up 4 Grain Safety Week, can you point out some of the biggest safety issues surrounding grain handling?
Seibert: I can, and unfortunately many of them continue to repeat year after year. So at the National Grain and Feed Association, we continue to focus our efforts on the ones that prevent the most potential SIF — serious injury or fatality.
Our focus is on elevated work, lockout tagout and energy isolation, bin entry, both material handling and mobile equipment operations. There's a lot of categories that that surround those as well, such as hot work permitting, dryer operations, over the road vehicles, shuttle loading operations. Really, when you think of a country elevator, the main focus is in and around those specific programs that have the most effect and provide the most SIF potential.
Schafer: So Stand Up 4 Grain Safety Week is a great way to put emphasis on these issues that employees face at grain elevators. Can you tell me what the program consists of and what's planned for that week?
Seibert: Monday, April 4, is our kickoff event, which is the only in-person portion and it will be live-streamed. We don't expect people from all over to come join us there, but the kickoff event is meant to focus on some live demonstrations over bin site hazards or potential hazards that could be found around bin sites, as well as sweep auger operations and design.
Tuesday is going to be a two-part session that's going to cover arc flashes and some best practices around protection from arc flash and operations around those MCC control rooms.
Wednesday we're going to cover weather hazards such as extreme cold and heat and significant weather events and provide some techniques to best protect workers from heat related injuries.
Thursday is over PPE and we're going to be discussing PPE from head to toe, including innovative PPE design, new PPE equipment that's out there, wearable technology that can ride around on employees throughout the day, so you can collect data, and personal fall protection equipment.
Friday is a slips, trips and falls, crushed, struck-by type hazards that can be associated with areas around the facility where grain loading and unloading operations take place.
Schafer: Great, that's a lot of ground to cover in one week. And this program is really unique in how it integrates virtual learning with some in-person, or that one in-person opportunity at the kickoff. How can facilities host a local Stand Up 4 Safety event?
Seibert: It's actually quite easy. Go to standup4grainsafety.org. Click on the resources tab at the top of the page and you're going to choose planning resources from the selection that'll that'll drop down. In there you're going to find materials, promotions and instructions on how to run your own stand up event at your facility.
As far as recognition goes, back on the homepage, you'll also see a recognition — recognize your participation tab — click that link and fill out the the form that's there and send that in and you'll receive a participation certificate for your facility.
Those who join can also use #standup4grainsafety on their social media apps like Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. You'll notice that the Stand Up 4 Grain Safety, we've created our own page on those three host sites, and pictures and those tags, they're great to include with the location of you and your team.
Schafer: Now this is a collaborative effort between NGFA and other partners. Can you tell me about the Alliance that helps put these resources together and promote it?
Seibert: The NGFA first signed their Alliance with OSHA in 2017. In 2021, we resigned the Alliance, the Grain Handling Safety Coalition, and GEAPS joined in the Alliance program.
Since joining together, we've been able to provide a more user friendly website and next-level training curriculum that would not have been possible without the many volunteers from each of the Alliance's groups really bringing their professional curriculum that they'd already produced, and partnering with our member companies to provide us the information needed to stay in front of videos and handouts and new slide presentations.
Schafer: Great. Now, you've touched on the registration site. Does this cost anything?
Seibert: It's absolutely free and you register like I described before from the website and it is at no cost to you.
Schafer: In closing, Jim, will you give viewers the top reasons why they should dedicate their resources and time to participate in Stand Up 4 Grain Safety Week?
Seibert: In partnership with the Grain Handling Safety Coalition, GEAPS and the NGFA, we've been able to, year after year, listen to our member companies and gain the pulse of of the industry. Our members are our driving focus, so as they share information with us, you know, we gathered from them, we take it into account when we begin to plan for the next event the following year.
We set out to provide the latest information in a usable fashion. We're able to source speakers better, they're on the leading edge of equipment design, safety procedures and facility operations.
To get this kind of information would typically require travel, hotel and a seminar registration fee. The Alliance's main goal is to bring high-quality industry relevant training to you at your facility in front of your team at no additional cost or downtime to your operation.
Schafer: Well, Jim, thank you so much for your time today. And I encourage everyone watching to visit standup4grainsafety.org and register. You can also find information on the event's Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn pages. Or you can search #standup4grainsafety. That's all for this edition of Feed & Grain Chat . Thank you for your time, Jim, and thank you, everyone, for watching!
Seibert: You're welcome, take care.
Grain operations managers seeking training resources can count on Stand Up 4 Grain Safety Week for five days' worth of online education. Brought to you by the Alliance — a collaboration of industry groups committed to safety, like NGFA, Grain Handling Safety Council and GEAPS — registration is open now and free for anyone who handles grain and would like to access the webinar series.
In this Feed & Grain Chat, Jim Seibert, NGFA's Director, Safety, Training & Education, shares the event's details and why safety is so important when handling grain.