Will AI replace Pesticide Handlers, Sprayers, and Applicators, Vegetation?
AI reaches little of this job’s work.
1/100
Low exposure
More exposed to AI than 4% of US workers.
- AI already used in
- 0% of the work
- As AI tools mature: up to
- 1% of the work
What the job involves
Mix or apply pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, or insecticides through sprays, dusts, vapors, soil incorporation, or chemical application on trees, shrubs, lawns, or crops. Usually requires specific training and state or federal certification.
Where AI reaches the work
The job’s main tasks, heaviest first, by how far AI reaches them.
Within reach(1)
- Provide driving instructions to truck drivers to ensure complete coverage of designated areas, using hand and horn signals.
Out of reach(9)
- Fill sprayer tanks with water and chemicals, according to formulas.
- Lift, push, and swing nozzles, hoses, and tubes to direct spray over designated areas.
- Mix pesticides, herbicides, or fungicides for application to trees, shrubs, lawns, or botanical crops.
- Clean or service machinery to ensure operating efficiency, using water, gasoline, lubricants, or hand tools.
- Connect hoses and nozzles selected according to terrain, distribution pattern requirements, types of infestations, and velocities.
and 4 more
Also called
Sprayer · Hand Sprayer · Applicator · Chemical Applicator · Lawn Specialist · Pesticide Applicator · Spray Technician (Spray Tech) · Applicator Sprayer
Related jobs
What these numbers mean
The score is the share of this job’s work, weighted by how important and frequent each task is, that AI could do in half the time: tasks an AI model could do alone count in full, tasks that need software built on AI count half.
“AI already used” is the share of the work in tasks where people are recorded using AI today. “As AI tools mature” counts every task AI could halve, with or without extra software.
The percentile compares the score with every job’s, weighted by how many people in the US do each one. Exposure means AI could change how the work is done, not that the job goes away. These are estimates for the typical job, not predictions.
Sources
- O*NET 31.0 Database, U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration
- GPTs are GPTs: Labor market impact potential of LLMs (task labels), Eloundou, Manning, Mishkin & Rock (2023), OpenAI and University of Pennsylvania
- Anthropic Economic Index: labor market impacts (task penetration), Anthropic
- Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 (national and metropolitan areas), U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics