A safety compliance model for container terminal operations: the roles of the safety climate, non-compliance cost and safety self-efficacy

The safety of terminal operations is the foundation of international commercial port operations. One of the main safety issues in the ports is that operators often fail to comply with safety codes. The existing literature has shown that the safety climate, safety self-efficacy, and safety compliance each play an important role in a company’s safety management, and this paper seeks to establish a safety compliance model in the maritime context. In particular, the research introduces the concept of non-compliance cost and explores the relationships between safety compliance and the non-compliance cost, the safety climate and safety self-efficacy. The researchers conducted an empirical study at container terminals in Taiwan, and applied the Hierarchical Linear Model to analyze the empirical data. The results of this study reveal that an organization’s safety climate, non-compliance cost and the employees’ safety self-efficacy positively affect worker safety compliance. Among these factors, the non-compliance cost has a mediating effect that mediates the relationship between the safety climate and safety compliance, although the non-compliance cost does not mediate the relationship between the employees’ safety self-efficacy and safety compliance. Based on these findings, this article discusses the theoretical and practical implications for safety management.