Proclamation 6822

by Bill Clinton

By the President of the United States of America
A Proclamation

America's agricultural productivity is a gift to our Nation and to people everywhere.

Using innovative techniques and the latest technology, our farmers, ranchers, and agricultural workers provide enough food and fiber to satisfy our needs and those of millions of people around the globe. However, we too often forget that farming can be a difficult and dangerous profession.

Agricultural workers are exposed daily to the risks associated with operating powerful machinery, managing livestock, working and travelling in adverse weather conditions, and performing countless other demanding tasks, often miles away from emergency medical care. Sadly, children and young people on our farms and ranches are particularly vulnerable to these hazards and more.

The simplest safety tool we have at hand is education. By word and by example, we must teach each new generation of Americans about the critical importance of knowledge, caution, and vigilance in farming and ranching activities. Wearing protective clothing and gear, learning the safety features that manufacturers build into equipment, and staying alert to possible dangers when working with livestock, chemicals, machinery, and vehicles-all of these measures can help to ensure longer, healthier lives for America's agricultural workers.

As important as education is to the safety and well-being of our agricultural workers, we must remember that quality health care is just as critical. We must strengthen our resolve to provide the citizens of our rural areas with high-quality, affordable, and accessible health care if we are truly to meet their needs.

By setting aside a special week each year to focus on the need for improved safety and health in our Nation's agricultural industry, we demonstrate to all of our agricultural workers that we value their lives and livelihood, that we appreciate their unsurpassed productivity, and that we honor their determined spirit.

Now, Therefore, I, William J. Clinton, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim September 17 through September 23, 1995, as "National Farm Safety and Health Week." I call upon government agencies, businesses, and professional associations that serve our agricultural sector to strengthen efforts to promote safety and health measures among our Nation's farm and ranch workers. I ask these workers to take advantage of educational programs and technical innovations that can help them to avoid injury and illness. Finally, I call upon the citizens of our Nation to reflect on the bounty we enjoy thanks to the labor of agricultural workers across the land. Join me in renewing our commitment to make their health and safety a national priority.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this thirteenth day of September, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and ninety-five, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and twentieth.

William J. Clinton

[Filed with the Office of the Federal Register, 11:06 a.m., September 14, 1995]