Food production, does, however, support 100 per cent of people being alive -- everybody eats.
Making changes on farm will increase the costs of that food production, eroding profits and reducing the economic viability of the farmers. The alternative is increased food prices. Neither scenario is ideal, but death and injury are worse.
To ensure that health and safety regulations actually do what is required requires data. University of Waikato's Professor Frank Scrimgeour has been working with a group of farmers and other interested people in order to identify the problems.
"Generalities end up in vacuous advice," he says. "We need to be certain about what accidents have occurred and what caused them. It then makes sense to focus on where the biggest gains can be made."
Professor Scrimgeour suggests that more research is required to identify what changes or what interventions can make a positive difference. "This is a crucial question. Many potential interventions just infuriate employees and managers and don't help at all."
Reducing accidents on farm will take a combination of education, design, and regulation.
Professor Scrimgeour's research has shown this has always been the case, but the current approach is focussed on only one aspect. "A multi-faceted approach has been recognised as the path forward for some time, but much of the recent conversation has focussed on regulation without adequately connecting it to education and design. When we lean too much on one element we end up with practices that are not fit-for-purpose."
In particular he points out that while health and safety committees can be useful in large manufacturing enterprises, they rarely make sense in small agricultural businesses.
In the USA, farms with 10 or fewer workers are not subject to Occupational Safety and Health Administration regulations.
In the UK, the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 require that 'all employers or the self-employed assess their own risk, and the risk to anyone working for them regarding their working environment'. The law focuses on 'all reasonably practicable steps to avoid accidents in the workplace' and states that 'this does not mean that you are required to completely eliminate all health and safety risks on your farm, but rather that you take all steps that are reasonably practical to ensure you and your staff work in a safe environment'. It emphasises sensible risk management and introducing controls that are proportionate to the risks.
New Zealand appears to be at the extreme of intervention, and questions must be asked about the compliance costs and likely effectiveness of the regulations. "Sustained improvement in health and safety outcomes are not achieved by brief periods of external control associated with intense monitoring," says Professor Scrimgeour.
"New Zealand solutions for health and safety must be pilot tested and adapted to progress and endure."
Through testing and adaptation we can create a system that leads the world; it's a global desire that people come home safely after work.
