USDOL Rationale for MSPA and Firefighters

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The Eleventh Circuit has held that the raking, gathering, baling, and loading of pine straw qualifies as agricultural employment under the third prong of the MSPA definition.  See Morante-Navarro, et al. v. T & Y Pine Straw, Inc., 350 F.3d 1163, 1172 (11th Cir. 2003).2 In Morante-Navarro, the Eleventh Circuit concluded that pine straw is an “agricultural or horticultural commodity” under MSPA.  Id. Although MSPA does not define that term, the court observed that Congress intended to broadly define agricultural employment in the statute.  Id. at 1167-69. The court also looked to a 1994 Wage and Hour Division opinion letter in which the Administrator stated that agricultural employment under MSPA includes forestry operations such as the handling of small, wild plants growing in the forest and the harvesting of evergreen boughs, yew bark, and ferns if performed with “predominately manual labor within a forest.”  Id. at 1170-71 (quoting WHD Administrator Opinion Letter No. 1732, WH-541, 1994 WL 975108 

(Dec. 1, 1994)). Based on this interpretation and its own reading of the statute, the Eleventh Circuit explained that the determination of whether an activity constitutes agricultural employment under MSPA must focus on the nature of the agricultural commodity and its manual cultivation, not the location of the activity.  Id. Accordingly, the court concluded that pine straw is an agricultural commodity so long as workers use agricultural techniques or methods to cultivate it and that workers handling pine straw are therefore engaged in agricultural employment under MSPA.  Id. at 1170-72. 

The Eleventh Circuit’s decision that the raking, gathering, baling, and loading of pine straw constitutes agricultural employment under MSPA is consistent with other court decisions concluding that the expansive scope of agricultural employment under MSPA includes work within the forestry industry.  In Bresgal v. Brock, 843 F.2d 1163, 1171-72 (9th Cir. 1987), the Ninth Circuit held that MSPA covers workers engaged in predominantly manual forestry work, such as tree planting, brush clearing, precommercial tree thinning, and forest firefighting activities.  

Similarly, in Bracamontes v. Weyerhaeuser Co., 840 F.2d 271, 276 (5th Cir. 1988), the Fifth Circuit concluded that Congress intended that agricultural employment under MSPA include forestry operations even when not performed on a traditional farm.  In that case, the Fifth Circuit determined that the planting of pine seedlings thus qualified as agricultural employment under MSPA. Id. at 276-77. The Eleventh Circuit also has determined that Congress specifically intended that the MSPA apply to farm labor contractors engaged in the forestry business. See Davis Forestry Corp. v. Smith, 707 F.2d 1325, 1328 n.3 (11th Cir. 1983). 

For all of these reasons, the Administrator has determined that workers engaged in the raking, gathering, baling, and loading of pine straw are engaged in agricultural employment under MSPA.  Such workers are therefore generally entitled to the protections of MSPA so long as their work is of a seasonal or temporary nature and their employer is subject to the statute.