This report reviews hazardous manual task risk assessments and recommends the tools that are most appropriate for use in New Zealand.

Read the report for our review and recommendations.

The Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 (HSWA) requires PCBUs to keep workers and others healthy and safe. This means that PCBUs must eliminate musculoskeletal risks from work, so far as is reasonably practicable. If risks can’t be eliminated, they must be minimised.

Hazardous manual task risk assessments can identify risk factors and support the implementation of controls. We have selected the suite of tools from the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), United Kingdom, as a holistic and easy-to-use approach to assess musculoskeletal risks. We are working to make these tools available from our website, but you can access them from the HSE website in the meantime.

Different task types will require different assessment tools, for example:

• Screening tools(external link) – lifting/lowering, carrying, pushing/pulling, handling while seated
• Manual Handling Assessment Charts (MAC tool)(external link) – lifting, carrying, team handling
• Risk Assessment of Pushing and Pulling (RAPP tool)(external link) – pushing and pulling
• Assessment of Repetitive Tasks of the upper limbs (ART tool)(external link) – repetitive upper limb tasks

Health and safety specialists such as ergonomists/human factors professionals and others can be used to support PCBUs to manage hazardous manual task risks.

While we have selected the HSE suite of tools, there are other risk assessment tools that PCBUs can use.