Global Village, the UAE and wider region’s leading multicultural family destination for culture, shopping, and entertainment, has retained its best practice Five Star Occupational Health and Safety Audit conducted by the British Safety Council for the fourth consecutive year.

The park achieved an overall score of 97.72% compared to 96.62% last year – retaining its position in the highly respected five-star “Excellent” category and setting benchmarks for the industry across the region.

Global Village is the only entertainment destination in the world to have been awarded the British Safety Council’s Sword of Honour – celebrating organisations that have reached the pinnacle of health, safety and environmental management.

Sutharson Sathaiah, Senior Manager of HSE and Risk at Global Village said: “Global Village is an immense outdoor destination with the complexity of thousands of partners and millions of guests each season. Retaining this coveted award is a great achievement and illustrates our determination to lead the way in terms of Health and Safety for our industry.

“The score we have achieved is testament to the commitment from top management, which flows through the entire organization. We take our Health and safety record and practices very seriously and we are honoured that this has been recognised by this prestigious organization.”

Global Village underwent a comprehensive, quantified and robust evaluation of its occupational health and safety policies, processes and practices. The audit measured performance against key health and safety management best practice indicators and a detailed review of multiple elements – including risk assessments to fire routes, first aid provisions to emergency planning within eight core areas from safety organisation to continuous improvement and crosschecks systems in place – evaluating their effectiveness and providing feedback.

Mike Robinson, CEO of British Safety Council, said: “The award of a five star grading following our occupational best practice Health and Safety Audit is an outstanding achievement and is reflective of a proactive organisation which is committed to continual improvement in its health and safety arrangements and managing risks to workers’ health, safety and wellbeing. Global Village should be very proud of this achievement.”

The audit process included documentation review, interviews with senior management, employees and other key stakeholders, together with sampling of operational activities. The high scores celebrate the excellence of Global Village and its employees in managing health, safety and environmental risks, deploying best practice techniques as well as maintaining consistently high standards of guest satisfaction.