"I think in the last six months there's been a shift in attitudes with on-farm health and safety. If you read rural media or follow social media farmers are more positive towards improving safety on farm."
While reluctant to be drawn on whether WorkSafe had changed its approach after negative publicity late last year, Mr McCone said there was a better understanding of what farmers faced daily and WorkSafe had departed from the previous regimented Department of Labour enforcement.
"There is definitely a more consistent approach and we've found our 'engage, educate and then enforce' practice is more successful," he said.
Around 150 inspectors are operating throughout the country (not including accident investigators) -- many so busy they've been seconded to deal with investigations.
No one should be surprised; the accident rate here is "huge and far out of proportion compared to other countries," he said.
Mr McCone believes our poor record is perhaps due to our frontier mentality where migrants who left the Motherland wanted to forget the strict society they had experienced, creating a country where sense of freedom was encouraged and innovation flourished, but this probably embedded more risk taking.
Another factor, often overlooked, was the generational changes in lifestyle and farm innovation. The modern farm was more frenetic in activity with vehicles and equipment more powerful, which compromised safety of staff and children.
The modern farm ute had V6 engines and while they have modern refinement they might not always be handled appropriately according to hazardous farm terrain.
While Kiwi farmers generally recognise the risks, it's more how they are managing the risk which is the underlying issue.
Anecdotal evidence purports that of farmers having an accident, at least 60 per cent admit they were careless as they knew the risk.
Once a risk was identified it should be acted on and staff informed of it immediately. Farmers were legally obligated to notify WorkSafe of an incident of serious harm.
"Farmers often talk about how they minimised a risk, but we would rather they considered whether they needed the risk in the first place," he said.
Federated Farmers has fielded complaints on how inspectors were conducting themselves and these experiences had left farmers sceptical of WorkSafe.
Mr McCone said WorkSafe were mindful of industry circumstances giving farmers plenty of notice that they were in the area and ready to make inspections.
"We usually do a letterbox drop before and that will have details asking when a suitable time is for us to visit. We've also put fliers in local retailers or services, as it can be hard getting hold of farmers when they are busy."
Inspectors generally come from manufacturing and construction backgrounds, though there were current or ex-farmers and others with agricultural experience from having been brought up on a farm.
WorkSafe had a policy where new inspectors worked alongside an experienced inspector. They are also briefed on what to look for so they have an understanding of farms and what to expect.
Mr McCone said it was frustrating for inspectors and problematic as some farmers had been misled on what was required to be compliant.
"Look, generally speaking every farm should have a health and safety plan. It's the law anyway and has been since 1992. As long as farmers have one and can demonstrate they are actually using it and regularly updating it that is a start."
Most farmers were "getting it and doing it". There was no template and if it works for you and you can show that, you don't need to follow every precedent, he said.
Mr McCone was keen to assure farmers that WorkSafe was not brandishing infringement notices without due process.
"If there is an immediate risk of harm we may present a prohibition notice which halts the activity until the issue is solved. Otherwise, we might ask that the farmer fixes a less urgent issue and we would note that on an improvement notice. We would not issue an infringement notice without a prior warning," he said.
WorkSafe is developing a toolkit that will assist inspectors with showing farmers how their farm compares with others and what changes they could make to improve safety.
Farmers, meanwhile, should be wary of forking out unnecessary money -- in some cases, thousands -- to self-appointed health and safety advisors.
"I've heard cases were farmers have paid $3500 for what was essentially a folder with information. Some of these people offering health and safety policies are misleading farmers and we are looking at developing a code of practice and an accreditation scheme along with the Health and Safety Association of NZ (HASANZ)."
WorkSafe had no specific timeframe for getting farmers up to an acceptable level of compliance. However, they had targets in mind for reducing instances of "serious harm".
By 2016 they hoped to reduce the instances of serious accidents by 10 per cent and 25 per cent by 2020. Mr McCone said: "This is eminently achievable. Of course having systems in place is one thing, but actually living them is something else."
If those targets were met it could generate hundreds of millions to the economy and reduce ACC costs by around $90 million.
Mr McCone said neither WorkSafe, nor Federated Farmers will change safety on farm -- it is only farmers themselves who have the power to do that.
