What does ‘Agriculture’ Mean under Oklahoma Workers’ Compensation Law?

Glossary Check

If you know anything about Oklahoma, you know agriculture is a big deal there, so it's not surprising that the state's workers' compensation law would include definitions related to agriculture, something Simply Research subscribers have access to. Oklahoma law contains an exemption from workers' compensation coverage that applies to employees engaged in agriculture, ranching, or horticulture activities as defined below.

Agriculture

"Agriculture" includes farming in all its branches and among other things includes the cultivation and tillage of the soil, dairying, the production, cultivation, growing, and harvesting of any agricultural or horticultural commodities, the raising of livestock, bees, fur-bearing animals, or poultry.

Agricultural or Horticultural Commodities

In general, "agricultural or horticultural commodities" refers to commodities resulting from the application of agricultural or horticultural techniques. Insofar as the term refers to products of the soil, it means commodities that are planted and cultivated by man. Among such commodities are the following: Grains, forage crops, fruits, vegetables, nuts, sugar crops, fiber crops, tobacco, and nursery products. Thus, employees engaged in growing wheat, corn, hay, onions, carrots, sugar cane, seed, or any other agricultural or horticultural commodity are engaged in "agriculture." In addition to such products of the soil, however, the term includes domesticated animals and some of their products such as milk, wool, eggs, and honey. The term does not include commodities produced by industrial techniques, by exploitation of mineral wealth or other natural resources, or by uncultivated natural growth. For example, peat humus or peat moss is not an agricultural commodity.

Workers' Comp 101: The crop, commodity, or livestock grown or raised by the employer must be federally funded and recognized by the United States Department of Agriculture to be eligible to claim the exemption under Oklahoma's workers' compensation law.

Livestock

"Livestock" is confined to the ordinary use of the word and includes only domestic animals ordinarily raised or used on farms. The term includes the following animals, among others: Cattle (both dairy and beef cattle), sheep, swine, horses, mules, donkeys, and goats. It does not include such animals as albino and other rats, mice, guinea pigs, and hamsters, which are ordinarily used by laboratories for research purposes. Fish are not "livestock", but employees employed in propagating or farming of fish may qualify for exemption.

Crops

"Crops" are defined in accordance with 7 C.F.R. 1437.13, which is the definition under federal law.

Agricultural Commodity

"Agricultural commodity" means wheat, cotton, flax, corn, dry beans, oats, barley, rye, tobacco, rice, peanuts, soybeans, sugar beets, sugar cane, tomatoes, grain sorghum, sunflowers, raisins, oranges, sweet corn, dry peas, freezing and canning peas, forage, apples, grapes, potatoes, timber and forests, nursery crops, citrus, and other fruits and vegetables, nuts, tame hay, native grass, hemp, aquacultural species (including, but not limited to, any species of finfish, mollusk, crustacean, or other aquatic invertebrate, amphibian, reptile, or aquatic plant propagated or reared in a controlled or selected environment), or any other agricultural commodity, excluding stored grain, determined by the Board, or any one or more of such commodities, as the context may indicate.

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