Health and safety issues in agriculture - Worker compensation insurance company perspective

Dan Hair, Zenith Insurance Company, Woodland Hills, CA

Employers, particularly those in California, are facing unprecedented increases in the cost of Workers’ Compensation Insurance, which they are mandated to purchase by law. The agricultural industry is not immune to the current crisis. Although industry injury frequency has been declining for several years, system costs have been rising at a double-digit rate for the last half-decade. Rising medical expenses, increasing fractional costs, broadening definitions of injury/illness, and poorer disability outcomes have driven the trend. Compensible workers’ compensation claims for illness due to chemical and biological exposures remain a very small piece of the injury picture. Chronic and acute soft tissue musculoskeletal injuries are the most frequent and some of the costliest losses incurred, often resulting in significant disability to injured workers.

The approach that Zenith Insurance Company takes is multi-faceted and dependent on collaboration with university based research. Peer reviewed exposure assessment models, often developed in the university, form the backbone of our approach to assisting our policyholders. Within that context, research is needed in several key areas. The impact of workplace culture is increasingly recognized as a key factor that determines the effectiveness of prevention efforts. Providing effective training and education to a multicultural workforce poses a challenge. The identification of cost effective workplace modifications in all phases of production agriculture is essential. Finally, the impact of an aging workforce is not well understood at this time. It is in these four areas where academia may help the employer, the worker, and the insurance industry find their way. Industry funding for focused research in these areas is possible, depending on the research community’s ability to provide practical answers in the short term in return.

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