"As a responsible and caring employer you cannot tolerate people getting harmed or injured while they are working for you," says Geraint Morris, global vice president of health and safety at Lafarge's Aggregates & Concrete division. "Anything less is simply unacceptable."

Effective communication of the zero harm goal is crucial in order to motivate and mobilize everyone in the organization to believe in it as a common goal, and become committed to ensuring that it is achieved. "If communicated correctly then everyone realizes that pursuing such a goal will result in mutual benefit," believes Geraint. "Employees value a safe work environment and the organization becomes more effective."

Lafarge is an important customer of Volvo, and like Volvo it has a culture of caring for its employees, wanting to look after its people in all respects. Driven by the management's strong commitment, the reduction of risk is a priority for all. The company's motto is 'Our goal is zero harm', and its chief executive Bruno Lafont has placed safety as Lafarge's No.1 priority. "We set ourselves the objective of halving lost time accidents at work between 2006 and 2008. We have achieved this and in the longer term, the Lafarge Group is aiming for zero accidents."

This is quite a challenge, as the €17.6 billion turnover cement, concrete and aggregates giant has over 90,000 employees - in 76 countries and over 2,000 production sites. And not only that - the group is active in countries in the developing world where risk control and regulation is less mature.

Lafarge's approach to safety is to refuse to accept that accidents are inevitable. "For every fatality on site it is estimated that there are at least 30 'lost time' injuries - and 300 lucky escapes," says Geraint. "But added to this there are probably 30,000 unsafe acts and conditions - and these are the root causes of all the other injuries and fatalities. Consequently, we must focus our efforts on eliminating unsafe acts and conditions - thereby reducing the potential for harm."