Insoo Kim

Ergonomic Assessment for Manual Materials Handling of Livestock Feed by Elderly Farmers in Korea

Objective: The purpose of the study is to evaluate appropriate weight for aged farmers in manually handling livestock feed in bags using ergonomic methods. Background: In the livestock industry in South Korea, despite the trend of aging of labor manpower, heavy items are still manually handled in many farms. In particular, among stockbreeding works, the handling of feed in bags weighing 25~30kg is reported as a cause of frequent injuries and musculoskeletal system diseases. However, studies on the standard for recommended weight allowed considering the physical characteristics of aged farmers older than 60 years with greatly decreased physical strength and muscle strength are insufficient. Method: To evaluate appropriate weight for handling of heavy livestock feed in bags, physical techniques for measuring recognized levels of physical work loads, the NLE (NIOSH lifting equation) a method that is an observation type technique, and an ergonomic modeling technique to predict compressive force imposed on L5/S1 were used. Subjects who participated in the experiment were organized into two groups of males/females with mean age exceeding 60 years, and lifting tasks were evaluated for nine weight levels. Results: Based on the results of psychophysical measurement, females showed a tendency of more drastic increases compared to males when weight was over 19kg. The results of estimation of regression models for the weight, 18.0 kg (r²=0.97) and 15.3kg (r²=0.97) were evaluated as stable load for males and females, respectively. In addition, both the observation type evaluation and ergonomic model evaluation showed stable loads in a range of 15~18kg. Conclusion: Given the results of the study, the weight of the feed in bags currently distributed to farms can become a cause of not only overexertion but also farm work related disasters such as musculoskeletal disorders and safety accidents. Providing livestock feed in bags weighing not more than 19kg for aged farmers is judged desirable, and managerial improvement for this matter is considered necessary. Application: The results of the present study can be utilized as useful data for institutional improvement of the weight of livestock feed in bags.

A Survey on the Present State of Occurrence of Safety Accidents and Safety and Health Management Levels Among Swine Farmers

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to seek measures for improvement and management of farm work safety and health by conducting questionnaire surveys and on-site investigations to ascertain the present state of occurrence of safety accidents and safety and health management levels among swine farmers. In particular, the purpose of this study is to provide basic data for the establishment of measures for the management of safety and health suitable to the characteristics of related working environments. Methods: Questionnaire surveys were conducted among 223 farmers engaged in swine farming in 14 regions, and 10 farms were visited in order to implement multilateral methods, including in-depth interviews, along with field surveys. Results: The surveys indicated that 26.2% of all respondents experienced farm-work related safety accidents and body-reaction related accidents showed a high ratio at 31.1% of all respondents. With regard to cause materials of safety accidents, work other than that directly related to swine raising showed high ratios of safety accidents, with pigsty facility related accidents at 26.6%. Although most workers recognized the dangers latent in the working environments, their behavior and responses to the prevention of safety accidents were still insufficient due to a lack of understanding of safety and health management. In the survey on the present state of personal hygiene and wearing of protective equipment, workers were found to have been exposed to dangerous and harmful environments both inside and outside pigsties, but the actual states of their wearing protective safety equipment were very poor. Conclusion: Given the results of this study, swine farmers well recognize problems in their control of safety accidents and management of safety and health, but their knowledge about safety and health education and management guidelines was insufficient. Therefore, safety and health education, public relations, and customized personal protective equipment suitable for swine raising work should be developed in order to address the foregoing problem.

A Survey on the Workplace Environment and Personal Protective Equipment of Poultry Farmers

National Academy of Agricultural science, Rural Development AdministrationABSTRACTObjectives: This study was conducted to investigate the actual condition of the farm work environment andpersonal protective equipment as part of the effort to improve livestock work for the safety and health of poultryfarmers and provide basic data for establishing plans to improve and develop personal protective equipment.Methods: For this purpose, a questionnaire survey on general information about stables, the poultry workenvironment, accidents, the wearing of work clothes and personal protective equipment, and the level ofawareness related to personal protective equipment was conducted among 148 poultry farmers.Results: As a result, it was found that poultry workplace environment was exposed to such risks as fine dusts;organic dusts; poisonous gases; odorous substances; chicken excrement; contact with chickens, bacteria orviruses; and accidents related to machine operation. Thirteen percent of respondents suffered severe respiratorydiseases, and the most frequently injured sites due to accidents were the hands (25.7%), knees (23.8%), arms(17.3%), and head (10.9%). The most frequent type of accident was collisions between the body and obstaclesor machinery during movement (36.4%), followed by erroneous machine operation such as feeders and electricshocks (8.5%). Regarding the wearing of work clothes and personal protective equipment, 51.7% of therespondents wore worn-out clothing or everyday clothes, whereas only 32.0% wore work clothes. Thepercentage of farmers who wore proper protective equipment for the work environment during poultry work was48.4%. The most frequently used type of protective equipment was boots (38.9%), followed by mask (36.7%),gloves (36.3%), appropriate work clothes (22.6%), quarantine clothes (17.6%), helmets (13.4%), and goggles(12.6%). The rate of wearing goggles was low because they were considered inconvenient and lowered workefficiency. Furthermore, they purchased everyday products available on the market for their personal protectiveequipment which were not appropriate for maintaining safety in an actual harmful environment and itsconsequent risks. As a result of the survey of the awareness level related to personal protective equipment, theirlevels of awareness of accidents and attitude proved to be average or higher, but the practice of wearingprotective equipment and the level of knowledge and management of personal protective equipment were lower. Conclusion: This survey found that the wearing status of personal protective equipment among poultry farmerswas insufficient even though they were exposed to risks. Most respondents were aware of the necessity ofwearing personal protective equipment and of the potential for accidents, but they did not wear proper protectiveequipment. Their wearing rate was low due to a lack of knowledge about protective equipment, as well as theinconvenience of wearing it. Therefore there is a need to improve and develop specialized personal protective

Agricultural Labor Environment and Work Safety

Objective: This study introduced the status of studies and the projects related with agricultural accident prevention carried out by the Rural Development Administration. This study was conducted to promote Korean farmers’ agricultural safety activation by analyzing study trends on farmers’ agricultural work safety. Background: Agriculture is one of the dangerous industries, and the agricultural accident rate is on the rise, due to recent serious aging and increased female work force. Such a phenomenon emerges as a serious problem from the social perspective, and therefore measures for farmers’ healthy and safe agricultural activities and accident prevention are required. Method: This study conducted literature review related with domestic and international agricultural safety and health. This study also examined the hazard factors of agricultural labor and injuries, agricultural safety and health system and policy, support and education for farmers’ safety practice, and the status of convenience tools and protection equipment, based on major study activities performed by the Rural Development Administration for recent four to five years. Results: Through the study results, the status of Korea’s agricultural safety system, compensation support policy, safety education of farmers for actual practice, and diverse channels including media were confirmed. This study also presented the R&D implementation status on convenience equipment and protective gear to prevent agricultural diseases and safety accidents. Conclusion: This study found out that continuous monitoring and efforts are required to prevent accidents for the Korea’s agricultural labor environment and agricultural safety, and that social bond of sympathy formation is demanded through effect analysis on the implemented projects including education and support projects. Furthermore, it can be understood that agricultural accident prevention should be carried out through shift from current government-led top down approach to bottom-up approach from itself. Application: The results of this study can be utilized as useful data for farmers’ safety and health.

Design of ICT-based Agricultural Safety Monitoring System Models

Objective: This study carried out base research to build an agricultural safety monitoring system through ICT convergence to reduce safety accidents and enhance welfare in life in the agricultural field. Background: The functions and values of rural villages as the space of living are recognized anew, but occupational accident rate due to farm work accidents is on the rise each year. Therefore, the seriousness of such a problem emerges. The convergence technology combining ICT is recently applied to industries overall, and therefore better services are offered. However, studies on ICT convergence has not yet been applied to the agricultural safety field. Method: This study identified ICT convergence service technology trends and representative serious accident types mainly occurring in agricultural activities. This study defined the major factors of farm work accidents and ICT to solve those accident factors including the sensor technology, wired/wireless communication technology and location information service, and applied them to prototype PCB for the development of an agricultural safety monitoring system. Results: This study proposed an emergency monitoring system for farmers and a harmful environment monitoring system. The ICT technology to prevent farm work accidents can be summarized as sensing technology, ICT and network technology and user interface technology. This study also designed PCB module configuration and situation judgment algorithm as basic research for proposed monitoring system development. Conclusion: The ICT-based agricultural safety monitoring research proposed in this study is expected to become the basis to build a future real time monitoring system, and also is expected to contribute to social safety and welfare service improvement for farmers. Application: The ICT convergence farmer accident prevention system will make contributions to the prevention of serious farm work accidents.