Safety culture and the perception of occupational health and safety of women employees in the textile industry: Sample of Diyarbakir province

It is the right of every employee to work in a safety and healthy environment. Unfavorable working conditions cause employees to experience work accidents and occupational diseases. Particularly, the integration of technology developed with the industrial revolution into production life has led to an increase in employees' occupational accidents and occupational diseases. The risks in working life undoubtedly affect every employee regardless of race, language, religion, gender and age. However, it is an undeniable fact that female employees with low employment in working life are more affected by these risks due to social roles. It is very important to provide a safety culture in workplaces in order to eliminate the negative conditions in working life, to rearrange the laws in order to improve the working conditions of women employees, to prevent occupational accidents, occupational diseases and work murders. In addition, the textile industry where has intense women employment, is a dangerous and labor-intensive sector and it is necessary the studies on this sector and women employees. In this study, it is aimed to reveal the perspective of women workers in the textile sector on Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) practices. In this context, a questionnaire prepared with a 5-point Likert type scale with 35 questions was applied to 180 women employees in a textile factory. The knowledge and experiences of women employees in terms of OHS were evaluated, and the situation of OHS culture in today's working conditions has been tried to be revealed from the perspective of women employees. As a result of the questionnaire, it was determined that 54% of the employees think that "the laws enacted for women employees should be improved", while 49% of them think that "the night shift is more challenging for female employees compared to male employees. In addition, it has been determined that married employees are more conscious and sensitive than single employees in terms of safety culture and OHS. While the impact index of single workers who consider personal-protective equipment to be important is 3.54, it was found to be 3.78 for married employees. When evaluated in general, it has been revealed that the safety culture and OHS awareness of women employees is insufficient.