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For effective surveillance of hired farm workers to occur, it is essential that NIOSH diversify its funding to include support for national and community-based farm worker organizations, migrant health centers, and farm worker unions. In the past, previous recipients of such funding have largely been land grant universities and large-scale medical centers, which in turn, have only allowed limited participation of those organizations that have direct contact with hired farm workers. Consequently, progress in improving hired farm worker health and safety has been limited by the lack of first-hand information.
By increasing the diversification of funding, a new dynamic will be introduced into the study of hired farm worker health and occupational safety as grass-root groups would have greater opportunity for incorporating their community knowledge and cultural and language skills into surveillance projects. More importantly, successful methods such as the use of promotoras in monitoring hired farm worker health status could be given greater financial support and thus expanded.
Beyond increasing distribution of funding, hired farm worker projects need to seek out alternative financial resources. Currently, President Clinton's Executive Order on Environmental Justice has created several grant opportunities. Through government agencies such as the EPA, community-based organizations can now apply for funds to finance environmentally-related projects. Since hired farm workers face a variety of occupational and environmental hazards on a regular basis, these grants represent an excellent opportunity for organizations considering health and occupational safety surveillance and research programs.
As for collaboration, NIOSH agricultural health and safety centers and universities with agricultural interests need to create more working partnerships with migrant health clinics and grassroots-based farm worker organizations. Previous health surveillance projects have demonstrated that such linkages can produce excellent results. Evidence of this success can be found in the studies of tuberculosis, parasites, and occupational injuries conducted by the University of North Carolina School of Public Health in cooperation with several North Carolina migrant health centers.
Other types of beneficial collaboration involve private foundations and non-profit farm worker organizations. An important example is the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and its health and safety initiatives, which were undertaken between 1992 and 1998. This organization's collective work with NIOSH, universities, and grassroots groups has produced many important farm worker health studies and has helped grantees generate funding from government and private sources for additional projects. From this standpoint, it is imperative that this type of leadership in the funding world be publicly recognized and encouraged.
The last area of collaboration involves increasing the cooperative efforts of governmental agencies. This should include expanding on the efforts of NIOSH and the EPA with respect to pesticides; creating more multi-agency task forces involving the Department of Labor, OSHA, and state health departments to monitor hired farm worker housing and field sanitation requirements; and providing more funding for the National Cancer Institute in its work with universities, migrant health centers, and nonprofit organizations in developing methodologies to track hired farm worker subjects for cancer studies.
This document is in the public domain and may be freely copied or reprinted.
NOTE: This document is provided for historical purposes only.
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