Colorado Gov. Jared Polis signed the Consumer Right To Repair Agricultural Equipment bill into law on April 25, making it the first U.S. right to repair bill focused on ag equipment to be approved by both houses and signed by a governor. While the law won’t go into effect until 2024, it is raising concerns around the industry. John Schmeiser, COO of the North American Equipment Dealers Assn. says the Colorado law is a good example that elected officials don’t understand the ag industry.


And no matter how much we try and educate them or the manufacturers trying to educate them, they're still not going to completely grasp it unless they've been in the business. And so we've run into situations where we've had to describe what a combine is to an elected official who's making a decision whether or not she should support a right to repair bill. That is concerning to me. And I want to maintain that an industry solution should always be preferable to a legislative solution because of that. And so we have John Deere, CNH, and I understand Kubota now talking to the American Farm Bureau on a memorandum of understanding. That's a great sign of industry working together, and we support that completely. And the message I would have out there to our customers is let's put right to repair legislation on hold for the time being, and let's see if these MOUs are going to work.
Schmeiser goes on to say if the question is truly about repairing equipment, the industry has the tools, diagnostic equipment and repair manuals to support farmers in doing those repairs. However, it if is about modification, violating EPA regulations by altering emissions systems is something the industry will not support. He says legislation should be put on hold to give the MOUs an opportunity to work.


For info on the how the right-to-repair movement is impacting the ag equipment industry, read our ongoing coverage here.