Ergonomic Design Intervention In Manual Incense Sticks Manufacturing

ABSTRACT

This study focused on the incense stick (known as agarbatti locally) manufacturers of Ahmedabad in the Gujarat state of India, with an eye to improving productivity and facilitating the occupational health and safety of the workers involved in this profession. There were incidences of work-related musculoskeletal disorders amongst the workers – 33 per cent of the study's respondents complained of pain in the lumbosacral segment of the spinal cord and 30 per cent reported pain in the upper arm at the end of the day's work. Based on the observations, four workstation prototypes were fabricated. Each was tested in the field by actual workers, as well as in the laboratory. Only after a prototype was accepted in principle by the users was the next prototype fabricated. Based on user feedback, the final prototype was produced which was capable of increasing productivity by approximately 15 per cent and reducing pain in different parts of the body; this was only after 15 days of user testing.

KEYWORDS:

• incense sticks
• musculoskeletal disorders
• low back pain

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Prabir Mukhopadhyay

Biography

Prabir Mukhopadhyay is currently an Associate Senior Faculty at the Post Graduate Campus of the National Institute of Design, Gandhinagar, India. He holds a PhD in Industrial Ergonomics from the University of Limerick, Ireland. His research interests are in the area of injury prediction, musculoskeletal disorders, work process design, etc. He teaches ergonomics to postgraduate and undergraduate design students across different disciplines.

Soumyajit Ghosal

Soumyajit Ghosal is currently the Acting Dean of the Research and Development Campus of the National Institute of Design at Bangalore. He holds a PhD in Ergonomics from the University of Calcutta, India. His research interests are industrial design and marketing, management of technology, safety and injury control, systems automatization, etc.