Heat stress likely to hamper workers' productivity

Heat stress due to rising temperatures may cause workers in Australia, the US and UK to miss 33 days of work per year, a new study found. The results showed the impact of global warming on productivity.

Employees in developed countries currently spend an average of 3.5 days off per year because of conditions related to heat stress. Those in developing countries – where air conditioning is less often available in workplaces – spend 6.6 days off recovering from excessive heat.

Researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences predict the number of missed work days would increase as world temperatures continue to rise. If the average global temperature rises by 4C by the year 2100, workers in Australia could miss more than a month’s worth of work yearly.

In Southeast Asia, the region forecast to be most severely hit by global warming, a 1.5C increase in the average temperature would cause workers to miss 94 days of work per year.

“Heat waves surely impact more seriously the developing countries in general,” said YU Shuang from the Chinese Academy of Sciences - Institute of Atmospheric Physics.

“But our study quantitatively estimated how much heatwaves would reduce productivity, and identified the most vulnerable regions over the world.”

The results of the study draw attention to the need for workplaces to adapt to rising temperatures and increasing heatwaves, the researchers said.