China's efforts to prevent accidents pay off last year, more work urged

BEIJING, Feb. 2 (Chinese media) -- China urged work safety

supervisors nationwide to continue accident prevention this year as efforts to

stress safety paid off last year, with declining number of accidents and deaths,

according to the State Administration of Work Safety (SAWS).

The number of accidents through last year fell 18.3

percent to 413,752 from 2007, while death toll was 91,172, down 10.2 percent

compared with 2007.

It was the first time since 1995 that accident death

toll fell below 100,000, the work safety regulator said.

The death rate of per 100 million yuan GDP fell 24.5

percent from 2007 to 0.312 last year.

Zhao Tiechui, senior SAWS official in charge of coal

mine supervision, said coal mine safety was improved in 2008. He attributed the

improvements to government efforts in closing illegal mines and work safety

enforcement.

Last year saw a drop of 19.3 percent and 15.1 percent

in the number of coal mine accidents and fatalities at the backdrop of a 7.5

percent increase in coal output to 2.72 billion tonnes.

In 2007, coal mine accidents claimed 3,770 lives in

China.

The death rate in coal mine accidents, per million

tonnes of coal produced, dropped 20.4 percent year-on-year to 1.182.

The administration chief Luo Lin urged a 1.4 percent

decline in the number of all accidents and a 2 percent drop in coal accidents

this year.

He added the regulator's focus of this year would be

to crack down on illegal production and operation and shut down more than 1,000

small coal mines to reduce the total number to below 10,000 by 2010.

Poor working conditions in small coal mines are

likely to pose threats to work safety. China closed 1,054 small coal mines in

2008, and government figures show almost 80 percent of the country's 16,000

mines fall within this category.