Occupational safety and health at Krones

Providing a safe and healthy working environment is not only a moral obligation for companies but also a legal mandate. Of course Krones, too, is taking measures to ensure the health and safety of its employees.

Employee health and a safe working environment are cornerstones of sustainability. They are a fundamental part of a company’s social responsibility to its employees. And to fulfil that responsibility, Krones takes a preventive approach: We employ specially trained safety specialists who identify potential workplace hazards and define suitable measures to reduce or eliminate them – and thus ultimately create a safe workplace environment. In general, these safety specialists work in three areas:

The Corporate Safety and Security department team focuses on the plants of Krones AG and its German subsidiaries.
It also covers all construction projects at customers’ plants worldwide (in collaboration with the local project management teams).
In addition, it supports the Krones Group’s international facilities and their certification. However, these sites also have their own safety specialists, with whom the German team collaborates closely.

From left: Christian Stöckl is responsible for all safety professionals at the German plants, Ulrich Schäfer heads the entire Corporate Safety and Security department.
Bertram Pretzl takes care of global security and environmental issues for the group.

A practical example of the complexity of this team’s duties is their work on site at our customers’ plants:

Krones installs equipment in a variety of different countries, each of which has its own unique laws.
Besides those national laws – which will often prescribe different standards than those customary in Germany – German law will also apply, for example, as it underlies the contracts of employees of our German sites.
Alongside these legal mandates, customers will often specify their own, additional safety rules to be followed.

The challenge in all cross-border activities is therefore to balance the various risks that arise in different environments and to maintain a good overview of all applicable laws and their implementation.

Identify hazards and control risks

In general, the safety specialists at all locations follow a similar approach to identifying hazards and taking steps to control the risks. These include the following:

Risk analysis: first, identify potential hazards to employees, assess the risks, and then take measures to reduce or eliminate the risks in accordance with the STOP hierarchy of controls

→ Perform regular efficacy checks and make adjustments for further changes

Workplace inspections by safety specialists: monitor the working environment
Handling accidents: identify and eliminate the source with the help of dedicated accident analysis tools
Share knowledge and experiences across the entire company to improve prevention

ISO 45001 – the occupational health and safety management system

The international standard ISO 45001 provides organisations with a framework for an effective occupational health and safety management system. A thorough audit conducted by an independent institution – in our case, TÜV SÜD – regularly examines various key areas such as processes, strategies, measures, reporting channels, and risk analysis within the company for non-conformance. For Krones, this audit revealed no material non-conformance issues. As a result, all locations of Krones AG and several subsidiaries were successfully certified in 2023.

ISO 45001 certification is an important part of Krones’ sustainability strategy as occupational safety and health are essential aspects of social responsibility. Our certification also contributed to an important milestone: In 2023, Krones was once again issued a Gold rating for sustainability by EcoVadis. Krones aims to expand its certification to more facilities in the future. Because our goal is not simply to improve our sustainability activities but to ensure occupational safety across the Krones Group.