Review of Intervention Research - Agriculture Forestry and Fishing Research at NIOSH - page 107

Relevance of Outputs to Small Businesses
Outputs are relevant to small businesses. It is well recognized that two of the
most important challenges in developing interventions for agriculture, forestry,
and fishing is that most operations are small and that effective regulation and
comprehensive surveillance programs do not exist. Most of the outputs produced
are relevant to or specifically produced for small operators.
Readability, Simplicity, and Design of Outputs
Intervention research outputs intended to be delivered to AFF workers have
generally been designed with the end user in mind. Materials examined were ap-
propriately readable and user-friendly.
The North American Guidelines for Children's Agricultural Tasks (NAGCAT)
was developed to guide parents in assigning farm jobs to children 7-16 years old.
The guidelines are targeted for use by parents, agricultural safety specialists, educa-
tors, youth groups, health professionals, farm organizations, public health profes-
sionals, and the mass media. The guideline booklets are user-friendly with respect
to readability, simplicity, and design.
Materials developed for migrant and minority-group orchard workers have
been included in the National Agriculture Safety Database, such as educational and
informational resources organized by topic, language, and format (for example,
fact sheet, news releases, and script). Whether this is the most effective manner to
reach these workers is not clear.
These examples make up only a small portion of the intervention research out-
puts produced, but they demonstrate an awareness of the need to prepare materials
in a user-friendly manner that is appropriate for the intended audience with some
exceptions such as the migrant workers who do not use computers as a source of
information and may have low English or Spanish literacy.
INTERMEDIATE OUTCOMES
AFF Program intervention research activities have resulted in numerous train-
ing and education outputs that are being used in the workplace or in school or
apprentice programs. They have also led to the development of standards, regula-
tions, public policy, and voluntary guidelines that have been transferred to or cre-
ated by the workplace in response to NIOSH outputs. Furthermore, new control
technology, personal protective equipment, and administrative control concepts
that are feasible for use have been adopted in the workplace to reduce risk factors.
Although objective data are difficult to obtain, results generally indicate that stake-
holders find value in AFF Program intervention research products, as indicated by