By Leah O'Tarrow
In a world where autonomous robots can act as your server in a restaurant or vacuum your floors and driverless cars can get you from A to B, the question is not when but how these machines will continue to integrate across industries and our lives.
So what happens when you mix agriculture with automation? The jury is still out in California.
While most states do not require drivers at the helm of tractors, California adheres to a decades-old California Division of Occupational Safety and Health (Cal/OSHA) provision, Title 8, §3441(b), that requires moving, self-powered agricultural equipment to have a person at the controls.
The current version of the rule dates to 1977, decades before modern autonomous tractors. Federal OSHA’s agricultural standards contain no equivalent requirement.
The provision effectively prevents fully autonomous tractors from operating around workers without an operator at the helm – a restriction growers and agricultural groups have spent years trying to change.
Michael Miller, director of government relations for the California Association of Winegrape Growers and a member of Cal/OSHA’s advisory committee on autonomous agricultural equipment, argues the state’s regulation has failed to keep pace with advances in agricultural technology.
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