Safety in Agriculture
Agricultural Safety Week is right around the corner (March 11-17, 2009). So it’s the perfect time to take a closer look at farm safety. Farming has always been dangerous work. Farm workers frequently suffer serious work-related injuries and illnesses—and fatalities are all too common. According to a report from the Canadian Agricultural Injury Surveillance Program (CAISP), agriculture is the third most hazardous occupation in Canada, behind only mining and logging. And in terms of fatalities, it’s first on the list. For example, three workers at a BC mushroom farm died last September in a confined space incident.
That’s why it’s so surprising that farming is less heavily regulated in terms of workplace health and safety than other industries. In Alberta, for example, the OHS Act doesn’t apply to most farms and their workers. And ON and PEI only brought farms under their OHS laws in the last few years. In addition, even though most jurisdictions’ OHS laws apply to farms, they don’t specifically address the safety issues and hazards unique to farming.
So in this edition of FOCUS ON, we’ll look at the common hazards farm workers face and discuss the regulation of farm safety. There’s a chart here spelling out the principal sources of farm health and safety regulation in each jurisdiction. And if you click here, you’ll find links to farm safety associations across Canada.
Defining Our Terms
When we use the term “farm” in this article, we’re referring to a workplace engaged in any type of agricultural activity, including ranching.
The Hazards & Injuries
The CAISP report found that throughout Canada, there were 1,256 fatalities and over 14,900 injuries requiring hospitalization from 1990 through 2000—or an average of 114 deaths and 1,500 hospitalizations per year. And the injury figure only includes injuries that required at least one day of hospitalization. So the total agricultural injury figure would actually be much higher if it also included injuries that were treated onsite or on an outpatient basis.
Farm owner-operators were the most common victims of work-related agricultural fatalities, accounting for 53% of the deaths. The second largest category was children of owner-operators, followed by workers. Tractor-related incidents were the leading causes of farm fatalities. The top 10 causes of work-related fatalities on farms are:
The leading causes of injuries on farms that required hospitalization were:
Farms are unique work environments. In addition to being industrial worksites, they may also be homes and places to live and play. Another distinction between farms and other worksites is that farms are often run by the owners and their families. So it’s no surprise that the CAISP report found that, in addition to farm owners and workers, children and elderly farmers are particularly vulnerable to injury. For example, although farmers over age 60 represent only 13.2% of farmers, they suffer 34.6% of all fatalities and 23.8% of all hospitalizations.
Insider Says: You can download CAISP’s report, Agricultural Injuries in Canada for 1990-2000, at http://meds.queensu.ca/~emresrch/caisp/natrep.html.
REGULATION OF FARM SAFETY
Farms are generally regulated by provincial and territorial OHS law, not federal law. The OHS law in every province and territory applies to farms—or at least some kinds of farms. But they regulate farm-related safety and hazards in two different ways:
Farm-specific regulation. Only two jurisdictions—BC and ON—have farm-specific regulations. In BC, Part 28 of the OHS Regulations is devoted to agriculture. This section applies to “agricultural operations on farm land,” which includes a wide range of farms, such as dairy, herb and poultry farms, orchards and wool, hide, feather or fur production. Part 28 addresses hazards unique to or common on farms, such as hay balers and manure pits. Of course, farms in BC must comply with not only the farm-specific requirements but also the general requirements in the OHS law, unless farms are specifically exempted from such requirements.
In Ontario, the Farming Operations Regulation took effect on June 30, 2006. Unlike in BC, it applies only to a very narrow list of farm types, including:
And the regulation applies only if the farm has 20 or more workers. It also doesn’t apply to farms run by their owners without any workers, regardless of the type of farm. In addition, the regulation doesn’t address any farm-specific hazards or safety issues. It merely spells out which farms are covered by the OHS Act and excludes those farms from compliance with the regulations except for certain designated regulations, such as those on critical injury and training.
General OHS regulations. In 10 jurisdictions—MB, NB, NL, NS, NT, NU, PEI, QC, SK and YT—the OHS regulations don’t specifically address farm-related safety and hazards. Instead, they regulate hazards that may be issues for farms as well as other industries, such as rollover protection when using powered mobile equipment. Thus, farms in these provinces and territories must also comply with all of the applicable terms of the general OHS law and regulations.
The Alberta Approach
It’s common to hear people say that Alberta’s OHS Act doesn’t apply to farms—period. However, that’s not entirely true. The Act defines “occupation” to include all businesses and employment except farming and ranching operations specified in the regulations. The Farming and Ranching Exemption Regulation then specifies that the following types of farming and ranching operations are excluded from the Act:
But the Regulation goes on to say that the following types of farms are covered by the Act:
So it’s true that in Alberta, the vast majority of farms aren’t covered by OHS law. But some farms are. And thus, those farms must comply with the applicable workplace safety requirements.
Conclusion
Farming makes an important contribution to the Canadian economy. And the economic costs associated with farm injuries and fatalities are also substantial. When you factor in the costs of treatment, rehabilitation and losses in productivity, agricultural injuries are responsible for hundreds of millions of dollars in economic loss every year in Canada. So if you’re the safety coordinator of a farm, you have the burden of ensuring that your farm takes adequate steps to ensure the health and safety of its workers. We hope that this article gives you some help in shouldering that heavy burden.
Know The Laws of Your Province
FARMING-RELATED SAFETY REGULATIONS
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