What are the specific risks for kitchen and catering safety?

Health and safety risks to catering staff in kitchen and catering environments including cuts, burns, slips, and trips and verbal abuse. Paying keen attention to catering health and safety is vitally important in a commercial kitchen. The fast-paced environment has many hazards that should be considered and identified in a risk assessment.

There are many hazards in this environment, some of which are mentioned below.

Slips, trips and falls

A common hazard is slipping on spillages, tripping on things that aren’t where they should be causing you to fall. Spilled or dropped food should always be cleared or mopped up immediately.

Knives

Accidents involving knives are common in the catering industry. They usually involve cuts to the non-knife hand and fingers but can lead to injuries on the upper arm and torso.

Cleavers are commonly used for chopping and the same controls for knives should be adopted.

Musculoskeletal Injuries

Staff could be at risk of back injury if they carry out a lot of lifting and carrying in their day-to-day duties. Repetitive work such as chopping, grating, slicing, and kneading can also lead to problems with upper limbs, which can affect wrists, arms, shoulders, and neck too.  

Burns and Scalds

Staff should avoid the risk of nasty burns by using gloves and being especially careful around hobs, ovens, and grills and when touching hot crockery or equipment.

Dermatitis

Work-related contact dermatitis is a skin disease caused by work. It is often called eczema and develops when the skin's barrier layer is damaged. This leads to redness, itching, swelling, blistering, flaking, and cracking. The most susceptible parts of the body are the hands, followed by the forearms and face.

Contact dermatitis is one of the main causes of ill health for catering staff such as chefs, cooks, and catering assistants.

There is also a homepage that lists the range of Health and Safety risks identified as relevant to the University's activities and facilities, together with information on the University's policies and arrangements on how these risks are to be managed and controlled.