Right to Repair Act Introduced

By: Sydney Sheffield 

The Right to Repair Act was recently introduced to the Senate, to allow farmers and ranchers to fix their own equipment. S.3549 was introduced by Senator Jon Tester (D-MT). 

The bill could help make it easier for farmers to repair their tractors independently. The legislation would require agriculture equipment manufacturers to make spare parts, instruction manuals, and software codes publicly available, allowing farmers to fix devices by themselves or hire third-party mechanics of their own choosing. 

“Manufacturers have far too much control over what farmers are allowed to do with their own equipment, and this costs farmers time and money,” said Rob Larew, President of the National Farmers Union. “Senator Tester’s bill would give farmers and independent mechanics the freedom to fix their equipment in a timely and cost-effective way.”

As technology advances, equipment is becoming more difficult and even impossible for farmers to repair. Last month, John Deere, the agricultural manufacturing company, released the first autonomous tractor, just the latest of technological advances in the field. For more information, check out this January 2022 Taking Stock D.C. article on the tractor. 

“I’ve been a farmer my whole life, and I’ve seen the unfair practices of equipment manufacturers make it harder and harder for folks to work on their tractors themselves—forcing them to go to an authorized mechanic and pay an arm and a leg for necessary repairs,” said Tester. “Manufacturers have prevented producers from fixing their own machines in order to bolster corporate profits, and they’ve done it at the expense of family farmers and ranchers, who work hard every day to harvest the food that feeds families across the country. Farmers operate in tight windows and on tight margins, and they simply can’t afford to waste time or money bringing their equipment to dealer authorized mechanics in the middle of a season. They need to be able to repair their own equipment, and this legislation will secure them that right.”

Right to Repair would require equipment manufacturers to:

• Make available any documentation, part, software, or tool required to diagnose, maintain, or repair their equipment.

• Provide means to disable and re-enable an electronic security lock or other security-related function to effect diagnostics, repair, or maintenance.

• Permit third-party software to provide interoperability with other parts/tools, and to protect both the farmer’s data and equipment from hackers.

• Ensure that when a manufacturer no longer produces documentation, parts, software, or tools for its equipment that the relevant copyrights and patents are placed in the public domain.

• Ensure parts are replaceable using commonly available tools without causing damage to the equipment or provide specialized tools to owners or independent providers on fair and reasonable terms.

• Return data ownership to farmers. Manufacturers currently collect and sell all the data generated by farmers, and this data is the farmers’ “secret sauce” for how they conduct their business.

The legislation will also empower the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to treat any violations of the above provisions as an unfair or deceptive acts. It also grants the FTC authority to promulgate regulations necessary to carry out this bill.