An Ergonomic Intervention to Alleviate Occupational Health Hazards and Drudgery of Women Worker in Fish Dressing Activity

Fish dressing operations are one of the important fish processing activities that have been predominantly carried out by female workers in the fish dressing sheds. The sheds are mostly located along coastlines and are attributed to poor work conditions, posing variety of hazards to workers. Traditionally, they are performing this activity in deep squatting posture continuously for hours using a knife. Most of them face work-related musculoskeletal disorders, injuries to the hands, infections, etc. Considering these points, an ergonomically designed fish dressing workstation was developed and its comparative ergonomic assessment conducted with the traditional method to determine the physiological cost of work, body discomfort, perceived exertion, and postural risks. An anthropometric database of 38 body dimensions and four strength parameters of 1026 workers was created from coastline region of Maharashtra. A survey of occupational health hazards of 68 participants from five fish dressing sheds in Ratnagiri district, India, was conducted using questionnaire-based interviews. The participating fish dressers reported 18%-39% lower physiological measures, 38% lower physiological cost of work, 49% lower body discomfort, perceived exertion, and postural risks in the ergonomic fish dressing workstation than those in the traditional method. The ergonomic intervention of the fish dressing workstation helps to reduce musculoskeletal disorders and drudgery while improving overall productivity and the wellbeing of the fish dressing workers.