The University of Florida’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, UF/IFAS, is holding training sessions in October and November for farm labor contractors, crew leaders, farm office staff and vehicle drivers to help them better manage farmworkers and foster workplace safety.
“As anyone who’s aware of farm labor in Florida, especially with our specialty crops including citrus and vegetables, realizes there’s a long history and not a very pleasant history about farm labor and how it’s been perceived to be treated or mistreated over many decades,” said IFAS Agricultural Economist Fritz Roca.
“Most people in the agriculture business recognize these issues and at the nexus of these issues are farm labor contractors, or who we call crew leaders. They’re the frontline supervisors that handle the seasonal migrant farmworkers around which a lot of these issues have risen.”
Individual training sessions cover topics ranging from equipment safety and preventing pesticide exposures to wage and hour regulations and anti-discrimination and harassment laws. Other sessions cover vehicle and driver safety regulations for those transporting workers back and forth from the fields.
2015 is the sixth year IFAS is offering the courses and over the years the scope of topics covered has increased. “People can sign up for one class. They can sign up for all ten,” said Roca. “If they sign up for at least eight and they pass a test at the end of each class, then we’re going to give them what we call a certificate of achievement and we’re calling this a certificate of farm labor management.”
The long-term goal is to make the certificate program an industry standard. “In other words, a grower or even a labor contractor will not employ a crew leader or a labor contractor unless those people have this certificate,” said Roca.
The classes cost $50 each. Training sites include UF Research and Education Centers in Belle Glade, Immokalee and Lake Alfred as well as the IFAS extension office in Sebring. For more information or to register visit http://swfrec.ifas.ufl.edu/programs/economics/fls.php.
