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Ministry of Employment and Labor building at Government Complex Sejong / Reporter Kim Bo-young

The government met with night shift workers across various sectors—including healthcare and caregiving, logistics and manufacturing, and delivery services—to listen to on-the-ground voices regarding health and safety in order to prepare measures to protect their health.

On the 24th, the Implementation Monitoring Team for the Roadmap to Reduce Actual Working Hours under the Ministry of Employment and Labor held a roundtable at the Sangyeonjae conference room near Seoul Station, with night shift workers from diverse industries and occupations in attendance. The meeting was arranged to hear about night work conditions, health and safety difficulties, and necessary protection measures.

The Implementation Monitoring Team for the Roadmap to Reduce Actual Working Hours is a body composed of labor, management, government, and experts to monitor the on-site implementation of the "Action Plans for the Roadmap to Reduce Actual Working Hours" jointly announced by labor, management, and the government late last year.

Participants agreed that simply reducing night work has its limits, emphasizing the need to establish working conditions that allow workers to stay healthy along with health and safety protection measures.

Examining difficulties by sector, participants in the hospital and caregiving fields noted that securing sufficient rest and sleep during work hours is difficult due to workforce shortages.

In the logistics and delivery sectors, concerns were raised regarding the high risk of safety accidents caused by physical fatigue. Reasons for engaging in night work included the ease of balancing jobs with daytime childcare and higher allowances, which were cited as motivations for choosing night shifts.

In response, labor, management, and the government plan to survey the scale and types of night work, analyze overseas cases, and prepare health protection measures for night shift workers in the second half of the year.

Bae Kiu-sik, co-head of the Implementation Monitoring Team, said, "Based on on-site voices, labor, management, government, and experts will continue discussions to establish health protection measures for night shift workers."

                                                                                                           Kim Bo-young