Worker Protection Standard Education in Kern County, California (Three years, Sept 2004 to Aug 2006)

COLLABORATORS: David Moore, Kern Co.  Agricultural Commissioner

During the past decade Kern County has had a disproportionately high number of pesticide exposure incidents. Some of these incidents have had effects on dozens to over a hundred people. The main objective was to make an effort to use education as a way to decrease the number of human exposure incidents that have occurred in Kern County.

To date this project has funded a total of 28 pesticide safety training meetings in 2005, 2006 and 2007. Ten of those trainings were train-the-trainer programs in English and Spanish that allowed attendees (primarily farm labor contractors) to become certified through DPR as Worker Protection Standard trainers. The other 20 meetings focused on pesticide safety issues related to Private Applicators, and these trainings were put on by staff at the Kern County Agricultural Commissioner's office.