Guidelines for children's work in agriculture

Background and Objectives: The North American Guidelines for Children's Agricultural Tasks (NAGCAT) are a safety resource to assist farm parents in assigning developmentally appropriate work for their children aged 7-16 years. NAGCAT were released in 1999 and since that time a growing body of scientific evidence has accumulated. This paper will assess programmatic and scientific evidence regarding NAGCAT and provide recommendations for research, policy, and programs for the next 10 years.

Methods: Programmatic evidence is being gathered from agricultural safety practitioners and a comprehensive synthesis of the peer-reviewed literature is being conducted.

Results: The NAGCAT resource has been used and modified in the U.S., Canada, Scandinavia, Australia, and the Philippines. More recently, at the request of agricultural employers, a version of NAGCAT were produced that included U.S. child labor regulations and employers' responsibilities. Research results reveal parents' use of NAGCAT improves if dissemination is accompanied by a farm visit from a safety specialist or if child development principles are provided along with the guidelines. In a review of injury cases, 70% to 80% of the most serious work-related injuries could have been prevented if NAGCAT had been applied. Anthropometric and ergonomic analyses of children's physical ability to operate tractors provide empirical evidence to support a higher age limit for tractor operations, higher than the ages currently recommended in NAGCAT.

Conclusion: Future priorities include the need to update the tractor operations guidelines in order to optimize the potential effectiveness of NAGCAT for preventing agricultural work-related injuries to children.