Abstract

GOYENECHE ORTEGON, Ruth Liliana  and  JIMENEZ SANCHEZ, Yenny Alexandra Carolina. Two Views on the Occupational Risk: Potato Growers in the Municipality of Toca, Boyaca, in Colombia. Rev. Cienc. Salud [online]. 2015, vol.13, n.2, pp.249-259. ISSN 1692-7273.  https://doi.org/10.12804/revsalud13.02.2015.09.

The purpose of this article is to understand the perspectives of occupational hazard in the context of social representations of potato growers. Materials and methods: For this, design case qualitative was used. As a data collecting technique, a semi-structured interview to two men who run agricultural labor, inhabitants in the municipality of Toca, Boyacá, was conducted. They were inquired about the concepts of care; health; their actions toward disease; on how to handle situations related to their job that affect health; and how do they live their processes of health and disease. Results: Content analysis was used, and showed that farmers connect risk and occupational risk with access to elements such as insecticides used for cultivation, and with exposure to several environmental factors such as temperature.They also expressed difficulties associated with potato cultivation and this meeting market demands and the growing costs in contrast to those of the product sales, this as a significantly affecting factor in situations as work-related mental stress, since they sustain that all this lead them to consider other agricultural activities, in order to make a living from their own craft. Discussion: The relationship between health and occupational health is associated with the specific labor clothing used by farmers when applying chemical substances, and with the way this work-wear clothing, in high proportion, is actually what they wear in their daily activities.

Keywords : Agriculture; knowledge-attitudes and health practices; social representations; occupational hazards.

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