Working tool redesign to reduce ergonomic risk of salt evaporation field workers based on RULA and REBA assessments using esMOCA Instrument

Abstract

What are the ergonomic risks of Indonesian salt evaporation field workers especially in Madura? This problem has not been much noticed, though salt production from Madura is the largest contributor to national salt production. This study aims to assess the level of ergonomic risk of salt evaporation field workers in Madura. Conduct ergonomic risk analysis and reduce the level of ergonomic risk through redesigning work tools with the REBA and RULA approaches. REBA and RULA assessments are conducted with esMOCA instrument application. This research shows that five activities of salt evaporation field workers pose a high ergonomic risk with a REBA and RULA score above 6. These five activities are, chopping salt deposits on salt field, scraping salt deposits on salt field, collecting and pile up salt deposits, picking up salt to the carrying basket, and packing salt into sack. One of these five activities, picking up salt activity poses the highest ergonomic risk with REBA score 11. Efforts undertaken to reduce risk were made by replacing shovel tool with pan hoe tool, REBA score dropped to 5.