Agribusiness ventures have changed dramatically throughout the last several decades, at times placing highly-skilled technicians alongside heavy equipment, livestock, and high-capacity processing plants. Injuries, therefore, are no longer limited to typical farm accidents; they now involve many of the same incidents experienced in the broader manufacturing and professional services sectors. Industry-wide, however, farm accidents continue to predominate as the leading cause of injuries.

Workers’ compensation requirements for agribusiness workers vary by state and are complicated by the prevalence of seasonal and migrant workers, and the combination of skilled and unskilled workers.

Sadly, injuries and fatalities in this category are high, and include:

• Exposure to chemicals
• Overturned tractors
• Equipment and machinery entanglements
• Exposure to carbon monoxide from small engines
• Vehicle and machinery collisions
• Grain elevator explosions and engulfments
• Cancer from excessive sun exposure

Spiris provides policies for this high-risk industry and works closely with our clients to mitigate the risk, and reduce injuries and premiums. For example, to prevent overturned tractor accidents, we might recommend that tractors be affixed with a new apparatus that prevents roll-overs, an all-too-common event responsible for 1,412 farm deaths between 1992 and 2005.

Covered businesses include, among others:

• Grain elevators
• Cattle, hog, and sheep breeding and raising
• Meat packing and processing
• Livestock auction houses
• Food processing
• Petting zoos
• Grain & field crop growers
• Feed milling and blending
• Commercial feedlots
• Dairy farms
• Vegetable farms
• Horse farms, breeders, trainers and boarders
• Fertilizer manufacturing
• Egg producers