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Seems to me you guys should get together and pressure the government to create a new category the better suites what you are doing. Seems to me that your farms are much safer than a lawn care provider where they use mowers, chainsaws and such.
Good vid. I certainly agree that there is error in lumping market gardening in with heavily mechanized farming; the risk and severity of injury does not appear to be equal. Reading through some of the conversation below, there are some good points made which might strengthen your case submission to the WCB if you address them in the first shot.
a) Since your network of people who operate on this scale is more extensive than most, and possibly the government's own records, it might help (especially with larger MG's like Le Ferme Quatre Temps) to gather some data on the observable frequency and type/severity of injury. Bureaucrats love data and may simply be rounding MG's up to mechanized agriculture out of precaution because there is insufficient data on small farms. I haven't looked but perhaps the WCB or the insurance entities they use have published their methods for determining rates. If you can compare the resulting health care cost risk to landscaping or any other which you wish to show as more risky, that's even better.
b) Address the back injury and other repetitive strain questions to show that you have considered it; if it isn't in plain writing up front, someone reading your case may presume you are ignoring it or had not thought of it. You could justly argue, too, that the BCS, Flame Weeder, Transplanter, and Greens Harvester reduce repetitive strain for a minimal risk of injury from the implement itself.
c) You may also need to convince them that small farming is a large enough industry to warrant the administrative overhead of creating a new category. Again, data may be helpful if you can wrangle it. I presume we're still a small blip as a percentage of the workforce or economic throughput, and having 'small' before 'farming' is already a bit of a handicap here. So a better angle might be to show a rate of growth in this field. Perhaps even cite other institutional recognition, like Vancouver's urban farming registry program (for what it's worth), of the sector. Those two points might convince them that they can get ahead of the curve on an emerging sub-sector.
Hope that helps
what you need is statistical evidence the risks are smaller for veg gardeners. you should be able to use actual work comp claims from small farmers, compared to the big boys actual claims. just saying your stuff is safe is anecdotal evidence. get the total claims and you will have something.
Welcome to Socialism Friends!
I agree entirely with the premise, but a tilther with an 18w drill will mangle a finger. However it's nowhere near as dangerous as a hedge trimmer or chainsaw.
Someone does NOT understand their laws, yet have the gumption to decree them. If there isn't a reason for the rule, the rule is invalid. If, when asked for the reason for the rule, the person asked cannot give one and be able to point out the documentation for it, they do not understand what they are doing. AND / OR someone is benefiting from the confusion.
The figures are skewed by the blueberry and strawberry farms on the coast where workers are not given proper training or protective equipment while spraying or allowed the proper intervals before reentry.
Cranberries too.
Thanks for bringing this nuance of regulation into the light.
It always comes down to Health and Safety. Government doesn't seem to understand the concept of individual responsibility. As a result, people miss out on job opportunities and experiences, weakening the economy. No wonder why people can't get jobs these days.
Why not waive workers comp and let private insurance companies set the price? The way things work now the bc government doesn't have to compete for your business. Just like the auto insurance rates you guys pay out there…. Outrageous.
Agreed that there should be a review to look at creating a new subclass of operations. The people that this farmer was talking to at WSBC are far removed from the people that set the rates. As a Canadian I am a strong supporter of the gains that our labour movement taught hard to win including workers compensation.
Sell them the tools and contract them to do specific duties and not a set amount of hours. This makes them sub contractors and gets around a lot of regulations.
Government kleptocrats have know clue about how business works.
I hope u are gradually expanding by putting up green houses each year untill u fall under the greenhouse vegable grower.
The benifits of starting growing early and later might help offset the cost also over time.
Either way lobby and lobby for changes.
Wouldn't small scale veg farming be a major risk for repetitive manual labor and back/knee/hip injuries from back breaking work? Riding in a large harvester is nothing compared to repetitive action labor injuries. As you can see it is easy to make an argument either way on this subject. However, Worker Comp has always been a point of contention for me. Here in the US they do all kinds of unfair things, audits, assign debt and collections, and you can't hardly handle the over the top abuse of power as a small business owner. When they decide you owe more… there is no way to fight unless you happen to find someone with a bit of power in the organization who understands the situation and they remedy it for you. It's all done by computers and small business owners fall in the cracks and often it burned. I hope the farmer in this video is able to find a solution!
They probably have some stats saying you're more profitable on average…. so they can fuck you harder. Government and religion are about the same things… CONTROLLING YOUR ASS and RAPING YOUR WALLET. OMG, there my trust score goes down again.
Worksafe BC is just another of many extortion arms of big Gov
Even if you did get injured they will still screw you over
Time to take back our own lives and be responsible for self
Jean claud van daming that farmstead! The gov thinks were kingsmen.
good luck with your petition
The Safety Board could come up with a "Urban Market Farm" classification, to distinguish from the larger, maybe rural "Market Farm". The Safety Board could distinguish between "hand tools and walk behind equipment" and "ride on farm tool"s when assessing rates. They could add up the rates for landscapers, greenhouse vegetable, greenhouse floral, garden maintenance, wild plant harvesting, average the rate, charge that to urban farmers.
Sorry I can't sign petition, I'm in the U.S.
Landscape and maintence here and I agree you farmers are girls ;)! All honesty tho much higher risk atleast once day I am 2-3m up ladder swing hedge trimmer around or a chain saw or both
Dang… Blessings and aloha
The Edible Landscape Company. Problem solved. Any and all can use this name.
You are the young healthy people who dont file or claim much in terms of healthcare, and many of the huge corporate farms are cigar smoking fatcats overindulging in salted meats and strong liquors. A coronary or aneurysim is inevitable and nearing rapidly.
If you look at US attempt to have universal health care and its health care systems, you see that they rely on younger, healthier people to pay relatively high premiums (even though they are statisitcally low-risk), because otherwise insurance and health care costs for older and more high risk populations would be more exorbitant than they already are (and they are finacially and spiritually crippling as is). It is a rigged system; calling it big corporate welfare/enrichment is not far from the mark in most instances.
One of the liabilities that are likely factored into the 4.24% premiums for vegetable farming are employees being injured through exposure to pesticides. I imagine that the smaller vegetable farmers use less pesticides than bigger farms as well.
Here in the states a place nearby has put low tunnels over everything to become a "greenhouse" grower. Sounds like there the 2% a year would pay for the materials quickly. They just roll the plastic off for the summer leaving the frames.
There's lots of back injuries with vegetable farming, from repetitive lumbar spine flexion.
Would sign it if I could. Definitely hope you guys are able to push this through as you make a clear argument for why the law is unfair.
answer is simple how to steal from peoples pocket. thye dont care what you use, all they need is money