The Journal of

Introduction: Pesticides used in agriculture in order to protect crops and plants from pests, diseases and weeds are regarded as one of the major sources of environmental pollution, with produce a negative effect on the health of living organisms, including humans.Therefore this study aimed to evaluate knowledge, attitude and practice of planting greenhouse operators in Yazd in regard with health hazards associated with pesticide use in 2012-2013.

Methods: This study was a cross-sectional study, which its population consisted of active nursery operators in Yazd. In this randomized study, 250 samples were selected out of 2233 greenhouse operators and then knowledge, attitudes and behavior of workers were measured using a questionnaire. After the study data were collected and codified, they ere entered into SPSS software. Moreover T-test and ANOVA tests were utilized to compare the average.

Results: The results of the present study revealed that out of all greenhouse operators, 134 (6/53%) had received pesticideuse training were trained. Education of 74 (29%) of the operaters were reported at the initial level. Experience of 104 operaters (9/41%) was revealed 6-10 years. 73 (2/29%) of operaters aged between 25 and 35 years. Moreover, the results showed, none of the officers receive the full credit(Maximum knowledge score is 13). Attitudes of 243 operaters towards the use of pesticides in greenhouses was reported at a high level. Performance of 138 operaters were moderate.

Conclusions: Although operaters nformation in such fields as precautions when working with pesticides lies relatively at a good level in some other contexts such as respiratory masks for spraying and special work uniform, lack of sufficient information was reported for indicating the need to develop and implement specialized training programs.