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Assignment of work involving farm tractors to children on North American farms †
Author(s) -
Marlenga Barbara,
Pickett William,
Berg Richard L.
Publication year - 2001
Publication title -
american journal of industrial medicine
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.7
H-Index - 104
eISSN - 1097-0274
pISSN - 0271-3586
DOI - 10.1002/ajim.1067
Subject(s) - tractor , work (physics) , medicine , descriptive statistics , agriculture , occupational safety and health , environmental health , population , agricultural machinery , telephone interview , human factors and ergonomics , poison control , operations management , agricultural science , engineering , geography , mathematics , statistics , environmental science , mechanical engineering , social science , archaeology , pathology , sociology , automotive engineering
Background Children are at high risk for tractor‐related injury. The North American Guidelines for Children's Agricultural Tasks (NAGCAT) provide recommendations for the assignment of tractor work. This analysis describes tractor‐related jobs assigned to farm children and compares them to NAGCAT. Methods A descriptive analysis was conducted of baseline data collected by telephone interview during a randomized, controlled trial. Results The study population consisted of 1,138 children who worked on 498 North American farms. A total of 2,389 farm jobs were reported and 456 (19.1%) involved operation of farm tractors. Leading types of tractor jobs were identified. Modest, yet important, percentages of children were assigned tractor work before the minimum ages recommended by NAGCAT. Conclusions Children on farms are involved in tractor work at a young age and some are involved in jobs that they are unlikely to have the developmental abilities to perform. NAGCAT is a new parental resource that can be applied to these work situations. Am. J. Ind. Med. 40:15–22, 2001. © 2001 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.