[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: 29CFR780.312]



[Page 543-544]

 

                             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 D_Employment in Agriculture That Is Exempted From the Minimum 

        Wage and Overtime Pay Requirements Under Section 13(a)(6)

 

Sec.  780.312  ``Hand harvest laborer'' defined.



    (a) The term hand harvest laborer for purposes of this exemption 

refers to farm workers engaged in harvesting by hand, or with hand 

tools, soil grown



[[Page 544]]



crops such as cotton, tobacco, grains, fruits, and vegetables. The term 

would not include harvesting operations performed by an employee with an 

electrically powered mechanical device, such as a ``blueberry picking 

tool.'' ``Hand-harvesting'' refers only to soil-grown crops and does not 

include any operation involving animals, such as shearing or lambing of 

sheep and catching chickens. Hand-harvesting is defined as manually 

gathering or severing the crop from the soil, stems, or roots at its 

growing position in the fields. Included are integral related 

operations, closely related geographically and in point of time, which 

are performed before the transportation to concentration points on the 

farm.



    For example:

    (1) Employees who take tobacco leaves from the pickers and string 

them on poles by hand qualify as ``hand harvest laborers'' because the 

stringing operation is performed in the field almost simultaneously with 

the picking and before transportation to the concentration point on the 

farm (drying shed).

    (2) The picking up of tomatoes by hand after hand pulling from the 

vines is ``hand-harvesting,'' as it is performed where the crop is 

severed and prior to its transportation to the packing shed.



    (b) The definition is limited to harvesting, and the performance by 

the hand harvester of any nonharvesting operation in the same workweek 

would cause the loss of the section 13(a)(6)(C) exemption.



    For example:

    (1) Employees who wrap tomatoes in a packing shed would not qualify, 

as the wrapping is a nonharvesting operation. (Schultz v. Durrence (S.D. 

Ga.) 63 CCH. Lab. Cas. 32,387; 19 W.H. Cases 747.)

    (2) Employees who hand pick small undesirable fruit prior to 

harvesting in order to insure a better crop would not qualify for the 

exemption. This is a preharvest culling operation performed as a part of 

the cultivation and growing operations not harvesting.

    (3) Employees who chop cotton, since this is a nonharvesting 

operation.