BGIA - Archive 2000: The role of safety technology in industry

The Federal Republic of Germany holds about one fifth of the world export market for machinery. Integrated safety technology must keep pace with the superior technical standard in the mechanical engineering sector and with the high speed at which innovative products appear.

Over the last years, most modern safety-related protective devices and controls for machinery and technical equipment, serving to detect and warn persons, have been placed on the market by German manufacturers. On the initiative of the competent German Berufsgenossenschaften (institutions for statutory accident insurance and prevention) the Berufsgenossenschaftliches Institut für Arbeitssicherheit - BIA has provided constructive assistance with the development and safety-technical assessment of many of these products.

Background information on the topic is contained in an interview with the deputy director of the test and certification body of the Berufsgenossenschaft for the precision mechanics and electrical engineering industry (Cologne) and the head of the unit "Electronics" within the department "Machinery safety - Control techniques" of the BIA. The interview (PDF, 120 kB, non-accessible) is available as PDF-file (in German only).