ChileanJAR

Since pesticide application in orchards presents a high degree of exposure, the operator must wear protective clothing to reduce contamination hazard. Conventional overalls are inadequate for prolonged wear because they are not breathable. However, the utilization of clothing with differential protection zones is a possibility for body parts with less contamination risk. The objective of this study was to determine the efficiency of sectorial protective clothing during pesticide application in orchards. The operator was protected with a waterproof jacket containing permeable materials along both sides of the body and the internal arm zone. The front of the legs was protected with a waterproof apron. A dose of 40 g ha^-1 of natrium fluorescein solution was applied with a pulverized air sprayer. The application rate was 2700 L ha^-1 with three repetitions of 25 minutes. The global protection was 87.7% and in the zones made of permeable material the protection was 50% of the exposure. Differential protective clothing offers security and comfort to the operator and presents a high reduction of pesticide exposure, mainly in the body parts with most contamination risk during application in the orchard.