[Code of Federal Regulations]

[Title 29, Volume 3]

[Revised as of July 1, 2006]

From the U.S. Government Printing Office via GPO Access

[CITE: 29CFR780.158]



[Page 537]

 

                             TITLE 29--LABOR

 

         CHAPTER V--WAGE AND HOUR DIVISION, DEPARTMENT OF LABOR

 

PART 780_EXEMPTIONS APPLICABLE TO AGRICULTURE, PROCESSING OF AGRICULTURAL 

COMMODITIES, AND RELATED SUBJECTS UNDER THE FAIR LABOR STANDARDS ACT--Table 

of Contents

 

                 Subpart B_General Scope of Agriculture

 

Sec.  780.158  Examples of other practices within section 3(f) if 

requirements are met.



    (a) As has been noted above, the term ``agriculture'' includes other 

practices performed by a farmer or on a farm as an incident to or in 

conjunction with the farming operations conducted by such farmer or on 

such farm in addition to the practices listed in section 3(f). The 

selling (including selling at roadside stands or by mail order and house 

to house selling) by a farmer and his employees of his agricultural 

commodities, dairy products, etc., is such a practice provided it does 

not amount to a separate business. Other such practices are office work 

and maintenance and protective work. Section 3(f) includes, for example, 

secretaries, clerks, bookkeepers, night watchmen, maintenance workers, 

engineers, and others who are employed by a farmer or on a farm if their 

work is part of the agricultural activity and is subordinate to the 

farming operations of such farmer or on such farm. (Damutz v. Pinchbeck, 

66 F. Supp. 667, aff'd. 158 F. 2d 882). Employees of a farmer who repair 

the mechanical implements used in farming, as a subordinate and 

necessary task incident to their employer's farming operations, are 

within section 3(f). It makes no difference that the work is done by a 

separate labor force in a repair shop maintained for the purpose, where 

the size of the farming operations is such as to justify it. Only 

employees engaged in the repair of equipment used in performing 

agricultural functions would be within section 3(f), however; employees 

repairing equipment used by the employer in industrial or other 

nonfarming activities would be outside the scope of agriculture. (Maneja 

v. Waialua, 349 U.S. 254.) The repair of equipment used by other farmers 

in their farming operations would not qualify as an agricultural 

practice incident to the farming operations of the farmer employing the 

repair workers.

    (b) The following are other examples of practices which may qualify 

as ``agriculture'' under the secondary meaning in section 3(f), when 

done on a farm, whether done by a farmer or by a contractor for the 

farmer, so long as they do not relate to farming operations on any other 

farms: The operation of a cook camp for the sole purpose of feeding 

persons engaged exclusively in agriculture on that farm; artificial 

insemination of the farm animals; custom corn shelling and grinding of 

feed for the farmer; the packing of apples by portable packing machines 

which are moved from farm to farm packing only apples grown on the 

particular farm where the packing is being performed; the culling, 

catching, cooping, and loading of poultry; the threshing of wheat; the 

shearing of sheep; the gathering and baling of straw.

    (c) It must be emphasized with respect to all practices performed on 

products for which exemption is claimed that they must be performed only 

on the products produced or raised by the particular farmer or on the 

particular farm (Mitchell v. Huntsville Nurseries, 267 F. 2d 286; Bowie 

v. Gonzalez, 117 F. 2d 11; Mitchell v. Hunt, 263 F. 2d 913; NLRB v. Olaa 

Sugar Co., 242 F. 2d 714; Farmers Reservoir Co. v. McComb, 337 U.S. 755; 

Walling v. Peacock Corp., 58 F. Supp. 880; Lenroot v. Hazelhurst 

Mercantile Co., 153 F. 2d 153; Jordan v. Stark Bros. Nurseries, 45 F. 

Supp. 769).



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