Assessment of physical and physiological parameters among the male and female bakery workers from Palpa district of democratic Nepal

Abstract

Nepal continues as one of the least developed economies of the world till date. The frequent changes in governance and political instability have contributed to the lack of entrepreneurial dynamism needed for stronger economic growth. Nowadays, bakery industries are the fastest growing small agro-industries leaving the footprint on day to day life in Palpa district. The male and female bakery workers of these industries experience some exigent conditions which prompted us to explore the physical, physiological, and nutritional health status of these bakery workers, with a special reference to the socio-political scenario in Nepal. This study was conducted in the Palpa district of Nepal. 78 male and 44 female bakery workers aged between 30-39 years were chosen for the study, as the young adults are more in this occupation. 38 healthy male and 26 female Bakery workers were chosen as control subjects for the study having same age group. All of them mostly were working as shopkeepers and housewives respectively from the same locality. All the different parameters were examined according to standard methods and Student’s t-test was executed to find out any significant difference (P<0.05) between the selected variables. Both the workers were noticeably healthy. But most of the female bakery workers were having obesity with significantly high obesity related parameters. Again, both the workers exhibited poor car- dio-respiratory functions with significantly higher hypertension and peak ex- piratory flow rate and poor Physical fitness index (PFI) scores. The result suggested that both male and female bakery workers showed abominable conditions, especially the female bakery workers. Hence, there must be some acts to save them by introducing some occupational aids or planned work designs for sustainable economic development.