Assessing chemical hazard in footwear and leather factories and developing recommendations for prevention

The task consisted in identifying chemical substances present at workstations in footwear factories, including volatile components emitted by glues used in manufacturing footwear. Chemical substances in samples of workplace air were determined with capillary gas chromatography together with mass spectometry. Volatile components of glue were determined with headspace microextraction together with capillary gas chromatography with mass spectometry. A draft method was also developed for determining at the same time compounds in workplace air that are most frequently present in the working environment in footwear factories: cyclohexane, ethylbenzene , n-hexane, methylcyclohexane, toluene and benzene, which is carcinogenic. A checklist was developed for occupational risk assessment caused by chemical substances present at workstations in footwear and leather factories. The checklist and the method of assessing exposure to chemical substances were verified in practice when estimating occupational risk in five enterprises that were studied.