Skill Practice and Safety
This domain marks the practical, safety and record-keeping side of the course: correct use of tools and chemicals, first aid, and safe workshop and field habits.
Core rules
- Personal protective equipment for spraying: gloves, boots, goggles, respirator, long-sleeved clothing, hat. Never spray against the wind; walk backwards so you do not brush treated plants.
- WHO hazard classification uses a colour triangle: red for extremely or highly hazardous, yellow for moderately hazardous, blue for slightly hazardous, green for products unlikely to present acute hazard. The label also carries the dose, waiting period and antidote statement.
- Storage: locked, ventilated, away from food and fodder, never decanted into drink bottles. Keep the original label.
- First aid: skin contact - wash with soap and water; eye splash - flush with clean water for about 15 minutes; swallowing - do not force vomiting for solvent-based products, carry the label to the doctor.
- Tool and workshop safety: sharpen away from the body, check handles, use goggles and remove loose clothing near moving parts, earth electrical equipment, keep a first-aid box and fire extinguisher.
- Records: sowing date, seed rate, fertilizer dose, spray date and product, harvest date and yield - the basis of both traceability and cost calculation.
Worked example
A pesticide label shows a yellow triangle, WHO Class II, and a waiting period of 7 days. The crop is ready in 5 days. What do you advise? Reasoning: yellow means moderately hazardous, so full PPE is compulsory. A 7-day waiting period means harvest must wait until 7 days after spraying; harvesting in 5 days would leave illegal residues. Advise the farmer to delay harvest by at least two more days.
Traps that cost marks
- Reading green as most hazardous and red as safest.
- Harvesting before the waiting period ends.
- Inducing vomiting when the label says not to.
- Storing pesticide in a soft-drink bottle.