By Sharon Omahen
University of Georgia
A $105,000 Occupational Safety and Health Administration grant
will help University of Georgia faculty members accomplish what
they’ve been trying to do on a shoestring budget: train the
state’s Hispanic landscape workers.
OSHA’s Susan Harwood Training Grants focus on improving workers’
on-the-job safety records. Plant pathologist Alfredo Martinez
serves as the project director for UGA.
The project is aimed at reducing equipment- and driving-related
injuries and the misuse of pesticides and unnecessary exposure to
them.
75 percent of the work force
“Of the 65,000 workers in the state’s green industry, 75 percent
are Hispanic,” Martinez said. “As three-fourths of the work force,
Hispanics are the backbone of this industry.”
The turf, ornamental and landscape companies that make up
Georgia’s green industry are among the fastest-growing in the
state.
And the trainings don’t just help those companies and their
workers. It’s important to everyone around them that these
workers are trained to work safely, Martinez said.
“Every day,” he said, “they’re mixing chemicals and using heavy
equipment and tools with rather limited training.”
Business owners are eager to have their Hispanic workers trained,
he said. The lower insurance premiums and other benefits of
reducing accidents are easy for them to see.
Martinez, horticulturist Marco Fonseca and other UGA colleagues
have trained Hispanic workers for years through programs in the
UGA College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.
Hispanic Specialists Group
Two years ago, they formed Georgia’s Hispanic Specialists
Group to
unify their efforts.
Jorge Atiles, an extension housing specialist with the UGA
College of Family and Consumer Sciences, helped with the grant
process. Martinez, Fonseca and Atiles have both professional and
personal reasons to see the program succeed.
They work closely with the green industry in their UGA programs,
and they’re all Hispanic. Martinez is from Mexico, Fonseca
Honduras and Atiles the Dominican Republic.
“The Hispanic work force in Georgia has grown 300 percent over
the past decade,” Fonseca said. “They’re a very important labor
force to agribusinesses in the state. And the UGA Extension
Service is in the position to deliver training to them across the
state where it is desperately needed.”
In the past, the group trained Hispanic workers primarily on
proper pesticide handling. With the grant, Martinez sees more
possibilities.
Bilingual training materials
“We plan to develop more in-depth trainings that include manuals
in both Spanish and English,” he said.
The HSG specialists plan to train both the Hispanic workers and
their managers. “We’ve developed a training for managers that
focuses on understanding cultural differences,” Fonseca said.
“These things affect production and safety.”
Over the past two years, the group has reached more than 500
Hispanic workers.
“The workers have learned to trust us, and they’re no longer
afraid to approach us,” Martinez said. “I get four to six calls a
week from Hispanics I have met who have questions and need more
information.”
Of the Hispanic workers who have come to his trainings, Martinez
said, 75 percent are Mexican. The rest are from Central or South
America.
Workers are young and productive
“From class surveys, we’ve seen that some of these Hispanic
workers have technical school or college degrees,” Martinez said.
“Most are young, single and in the prime of their productivity.
They can easily work 14 hour days at strong, labor-intensive
work.”
Most say they’re in the United States to work so they can send
money back home to their families. Their goal is to return home.
“Regardless of why they’re here, they’re here and working in a
vital industry, and they need to be trained,” he said.
Fonseca, who began training Hispanic landscape and greenhouse
workers as a Cherokee County extension agent, said the training
needs are great.
“The poultry industry in the state has the need, too,” he said.
“The majority of their workers are now Hispanic.”
