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Self-employed persons has been regulated in new revised Occupational Safety and Health Act. Most jobs of tea farmers include tea collecting, manufacturing, use of farming equipment or occasionally spraying pesticides and weeding. Lack of occupational health and safety knowledge in tea industry has resulted in many incidents include cutting and human factors-related injuries. The purpose of this study is to explore the potential hazards in Tea industry, the effect of newly revised regulations on Tea industry, awareness of occupational safety and health, and provide key strategy of injury prevention in tea industry. The results show that, besides traffic accidents, the work hazards of tea farmers include falls, cutting injury and human factors-related hazards. The results of safety and health awareness survey include (1) regarding safety regulation cognition of different education level, the University was significantly higher than that of the high schools. (2) regarding workplace safety cognition of different education level, high school was significantly higher than that of the University. (3) regarding safety regulation cognition of different area of residence, Lugu farmers were significantly higher than that of Min-jan. (4) regarding the effectiveness of education and training, Lugu farmers were significantly higher than that of Min-jan. (5) regression analysis showed that the safety regulations, workplace safety, education and training and industry trends are very important for the safety and health awareness. As the tea farmers are mostly self-employed, as a matter of fact, more effort should be made in their safety and health education/training. Trade union activities such as hiking are recommended to promote the safety and health advocacy and safety/health-related knowledge of tea farmers. Or utilize the health of safety and health counseling through the " Plan of improving work safety service" provided by the Ministry of Labor Occupational Safety to improve the safety and health facilities and equipment, and advocacy related to Occupational Safety and Health Acts and regulations to reduce the occupational incidents in tea industry.
Keywords: Tea farmers, Self-employed, Safety awareness, Job safety analysis
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