Agricultural health and safety is in farmers’ hands
Released 16 Jun 2011
Federated Farmers Health and Safety Manual launch (Thursday)
Media are invited to attend or listen into the launch of the Federated Farmers Health and Safety Manual this morning. This manual aims to help New Zealand farmers identify potential workplace safety issues and take the steps needed to minimise on-farm risks.
The manual will be launched in the presence of the Minister of Labour, the Hon Kate Wilkinson at 11.30.
Donald Aubrey, Federated Farmers agricultural health and safety spokesperson, will speak about the importance of good health and safety practices on New Zealand farms.
WHEN: Thursday, 16 June 2011
TIME: 11.30 am - 12.15 pm
WHERE: Federated Farmers, Level 6, 154 Featherston Street, Wellington
AUDIO: Dial 0800 332 663 Conference number 2461
Access code 1234
Donald Aubrey - Federated Farmers agricultural health and safety spokesperson
Before I welcome everybody here, I must first comment on Federated Farmers Otago provincial president Mike Lord who wrote a telling commentary in his first provincial newsletter this year.
Over Christmas, Mike was driving in the Otago countryside, when he came around a bend to find an unhelmeted farmer cruising on a quad bike in the middle of a very narrow and winding back country road. Now this is enough to get the blood pressure and adrenalin rushing to avoid adding to the holiday road toll. Mike wasn't going hell for leather and through sensible driving had time to avoid a potentially serious road traffic accident.
But what got to him, really got him steamed, was that this farmer had two similarly unhelmeted children along for the ride.
While this happened in Otago it could have been anywhere in New Zealand because farmers use quad bikes to move stock on country roads each and every day. But once you are on a road you are legally bound to be helmeted, for the good reason that roads are unforgiving.
This unhelmeted farmer was being foolhardy with his own safety and the children he had aboard. In an emergency stop these kids would have been catapulted and it's this kind of cowboy behavior that invites knee-jerk calls for impractical regulations and controls.
Although quad bikes are known by some as all terrain vehicles they don't take kindly to road surfaces and sealed roads in particular. This is down to the bike's very design and set up. On road, everything from a quad bike's tyres, to a lack of mirrors screams ‘use with caution'. Given they're not the quietest things to ride; you can't rely on hearing other road users either, especially if you are focused on the task in hand.
Minister Kate Wilkinson, please accept my very warm welcome to Federated Farmers here in Wellington.
I would like to also welcome representatives from the Department of Labour, our legal advisors and fellow members of the agricultural community. Welcome.
The anecdote of the quad bike would probably get talkback hosts calling for regulation. However, even in heavily regulated environments, such as the highway, 48 motorcyclists were killed on the road in 2009 with a further 1,369 injured.
The key message I wish to convey here is one of changing culture. This is what today's launch of Federated Farmers Health and Safety Manual is about and it doesn't matter if it's a quad bike or a motorcyclist on the road, changing culture changes outcomes and with Federated Farmers Health and Safety Manual, we sincerely hope that we can all do better.
Creating a professional and effective workplace health and safety culture is key not just to saving premiums, but to slashing the social and economic impacts that radiate out from any single incident.
It is instructive that this manual comes from the request of Federated Farmers members. Farmers recognise health and safety is an important part of good business practice.
We see this from sales of this manual, which has been available to our membership after a soft launch. More than 200 have been purchased in the last 10 days, without fanfare or publicity.
At 29 pages, plus Hazard and Accident registers, this manual is an easily read and digested plain-english guide in what is a complex and serious area of business. It is written in a language and a style that farmers understand and it is uniquely tailored to the farm business environment.
Farmers get the importance of health and safety because each farm worker in New Zealand generates around $279,000 in gross revenue. By way of comparison, for tourism, that sum is around $80,000.
Our remuneration survey with Rabobank shows that farm workers are remunerated very well in comparison to non-farmers. Workers receive a lot of instruction and training to make them these productive dynamos.
Workers are an asset as tangible as farm infrastructure. As farms are primarily small businesses, the loss of a single staff member as a result of down time due to an accident can cost that business thousands of dollars in lost productivity or in temporary staffing costs.
As farm revenue comes at fixed points in the year, farm safety failure can cause a shock to a farmer's cash flow. It provides a compelling reason to take farm safety seriously and by seriously, that means having the policies and processes in place.
The reality is that injured farmers cannot work and that directly impacts farm productivity.
ACC data, after all, puts the cost of farm accident related treatment and compensation in 2009 at $78.5 million.
On top of that, we know that through various accounts, agriculture parted with some $150 million in premiums.
But it doesn't stop there.
$228.5 million dollars is a large sum in anyone's language but a 2008 NZIER report revealed the massive hidden cost of work place health and safety.
It found workplace health and safety across all sectors cost $1.2 billion directly, but the indirect cost, the cost on families, society and the wider economy, ballooned out to well over $12 billion.
Ladies and gentlemen, the direct cost of workplace health is the tip of a much larger iceberg.
Improving agriculture's health and safety record will not just save us millions in direct premium costs, but help to reduce our share of a much larger indirect social and economic cost.
The Federated Farmers Farmers Health and Safety Manual helps farm employers meet their full obligations under the Health and Safety in Employment Act.
The cost of not taking farm safety seriously is found in prosecutions and the courts increasingly take a dim view of employers who fail to take reasonable steps.
In the case of a recent quad bike fatality, an employer was prosecuted under the Act for not ensuring the rider was appropriately trained. This led to a $78,000 fine and a $60,000 reparation payment to the late employee's family.
This $138,000 bill does not reflect considerable legal and other costs. It does not take into account the effect of the prosecution on the business and its managers.
With any accident there is emotional harm and stress. Some farm businesses could even fail under the stress and financial impact of an HSE prosecution.
In farming today there is no room for a Gallic shrug. There is no room for ‘she'll be right' either.
If we want to prevent regulation then we need to improve our safety record. We saw this in May's results for the Department of Labour's quad bike safety campaign, with 56 written warnings or improvement notices issued after 162 farm visits.
Yet, we need not view this as a compliance burden, but as an opportunity. In farming there are two ways to increase revenue and that's by increasing production or reducing costs.
As I said before, our staff are an invaluable asset who need to be protected from preventable risks that if not heeded, will impact your bottom line.
I urge farmers to look at the thousands of dollars ACC account premiums cost and to understand that the Government has created the opportunity for us to slash this cost through good safety.
We can't do it with tax or with GST, but on ACC, consistently a bug bear from farmer surveys, we have the means to reduce the cost of premiums.
Minister, individual employer responsibility with regard to workplace health and safety can save farm businesses money to be used elsewhere.
That is why Federated Farmers is excited by this launch and that you are present for it.
Federated Farmers Farmers Health and Safety Manual is backed by our 0800 FARMING legal line for members and is the means for farm employers to not just fulfill their obligations, but to do so on an on-going basis.
Occupational health and safety makes sense because good safety as we all know is no accident.
Thank you.
For further information contact:
Donald Aubrey, Federated Farmers agricultural health and safety spokesperson, 027 623 7157 [until Thursday], 03 696 3747 [from Friday]
