Catherwood LibraryILR School

Almost thirty years after California first banned the use of short-handled hoes in commercial farming because of the serious back injuries they caused to workers weeding crops hunched over, worker advocates are fighting to close a loophole in the law. Seeking to protect laborers against agri-business employers who skirt the ban by having workers weed by hand or with knives, the labor movement has called on the California Occupational Safety and Health Administration to ban weeding tools under four feet. Growers associations are expected to put up a hard fight against the proposed ban, and among organic growers who cannot use chemical weed killers even the socially conscious are asking for time limits on hand-weeding instead of an all out ban.