Locations: 7 Vineyard Management Group, spread across Marlborough and Hawkes Bay with wineries in both regions.
Context: Varied Manual Handling demands across both viticulture and winemaking.
First engaged Provention: 2022
THE CHALLENGE
Prior to engaging Provention, Delegat:
Was receiving a steady number of back, shoulder and neck strains and sprains from staff caused by heavy lifting, carrying heavy equipment and repetitive tasks over extended periods. Approximately 25% of these injuries resulted in lost time.
Had some staff suffering more than one strain/sprain injury each year.
Had not quantified the overall impact these injuries were having across the business.
Had difficulty finding practical solutions and a provider who understood our work environment and challenges.
DELEGAT APPROACH
Delegat partnered with Provention to make an impact on their Manual Handling-related injuries and improve the physical well-being of their employees.
Provention Delivery: Interactive Manual Handling sessions delivered directly to all employees. The sessions included practical and industry-specific applications of the safe movement principles. All existing staff in the first rollout in 2022, following that annual training was booked for any new starters.
Habit Maker Toolkit: A suite of support resources rolled out gradually, ensuring safe movement principles were reinforced regularly to drive habit change and long-term success.
THE IMPACT
115 staff trained across 9 locations.
Reported LTI’s for Manual Handling have dropped from:
12 in 2022
10 in 2023
3 in 2024
nil in 2025
There is an ongoing focus on training and reminding staff to follow the lifting and handling procedures they have been taught.
Managers are ensuring regular rotation of staff for repetitive tasks and they are being monitored to avoid prolonged repetitive motion. They are continuously looking at manual handling tasks to look for other options such as engineering to eliminate the need for manual handling as they understand the risk.
Feedback from Delegat management is:
‘The team love the First Move training and find it very helpful and applicable to daily life. Even some of the more discerning vineyard operators who are often negative says it’s fantastic.”
KEY TAKEAWAY
Working with Prevention ensures Delegat staff understand and practise effective manual handling techniques and this greatly reduces the likelihood of them suffering a strain or sprain through manual handling.
What organisations that reduce manual handling injuries do differently By this point, the pattern is clear. Manual handling training is delivered. Workers hear the right messages and yet injury numbers…
In every workplace there are people doing the same manual handling tasks as everyone else, under the same conditions, who somehow avoid the injuries affecting their peers. Same loads.Same environment.Same…
Most organisations have delivered manual handling training, often more than once, yet the same strains and sprains keep appearing. At some point that raises an obvious question – if training…
Provention’s First Move programmes equip individuals with the knowledge to move, think and look after their physical well-being, creating habitual movement and preventing injury.
