Being well as a farmer is a bright idea for the wellbeing of the farm

You can’t have a healthy farm business without healthy farmers – and agriculture still ranks as one of the most dangerous industries in Australia.

This is why the National Centre for Farmer Health is staging the two-day Farming a Brighter Future symposium, starting on Thursday, September 8 2022 at Waurn Ponds Estate in Waurn Ponds, Victoria. 

NCFH director Alison Kennedy says the two-day event will explore the health, wellbeing, and safety challenges – and opportunities – faced by Australia’s agricultural workforce, and demonstrate how research is being translated into action to create better outcomes for the sector as a whole.

“Through a combination of workshops, panel discussions and presentations, the event will provide a forum to foster learning, promote discussion and extend networks to make a real difference to farmers’ lives, now and into the future,” Dr Kennedy says.

“And it’s not just the physical risks that are associated with the demands on every farmer’s life, the increased pressure on their overall wellbeing and mental health will be high on our agenda because it is now a debate that thankfully has been put front and centre when looking at farming,” she says.

“For too long famers have fought that battle on their own, and when you try that, it’s a tough fight to win.”
Dr Kennedy says the symposium will also address the imagery and language of farm health and safety and its role in media messaging to spread the news.

An esteemed lineup of speakers – including Minister for Agriculture Gayle Tierney and Plant A Seed For Safety founder Alex Thomas – will be presenting at the symposium, which will be MC’d by Kristen Diprose.  

“Influencing engagement and health, wellbeing and safety through media messaging will be a panel presentation and discussion involving experts from media/social media through to communications and social marketing. The conversation will explore how to engage effectively with farming populations and how we can use appropriate content, language and imagery to represent diversity, avoid stereotypes, and support and promote health, wellbeing and safety,” Dr Kennedy added.

“Day two kicks off with a presentation and discussion from researchers, educators and service providers to highlight current risks to farmer mental health and demonstrate approaches to preventing, mitigating and responding to risk through education/training, tailored resource development and service provision,” she says.

“Our final session of the symposium will highlight innovative thinking, inspire best practice approaches, and identify areas for future growth in farmer health, wellbeing and safety from the perspective of leaders in agriculture (including young farmers), rural research and rural health.”

The symposium will also host the AusChem professional development day.

Tickets are still available for both in-person and virtual attendance. Learn more and register on the National Centre for Farmer Health website through the button below. 

Available for quotes:
Dr. Alison Kennedy, Director of the National Centre for Farmer Health
alison.kennedy@wdhs.net 
(03) 5551 8533

Media Contact 
Annabelle Macgugan 
amacgugan@wdhs.net
0458517699 

Episode 14: “Understanding the mental impact of injuries on farm”

On-farm injuries, particularly severe ones, create two immediate, often long-lasting problems – what happens to the farm and, more importantly, what happens to the farmer? In this episode, we discuss the often long-lasting mental and physical impacts of an injury on the farm – and what you can do to prevent them. 

Under the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004 (OHS Act) employers and self-employed persons must notify WorkSafe immediately after becoming aware a notifiable incident has occurred.  If employers/farmers are unsure if they need to report an incident they can call WorkSafe on 13 23 60.

Now streaming on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and here.

This podcast is part of the Primary Producer Knowledge Network led by the National Centre for Farmer Health to promote mentally healthy workplaces. Campfire, part of the Primary Producer Knowledge Network, was funded by the Victorian State Government’s WorkSafe WorkWell Mental Health Improvement Fund.

Don’t underestimate the mental impacts of injuries on your farm – or what you can do to prevent them

Factors in your workplace can impact on your mental health – such as poor workplace relationships, issues with communication, low job control, and high work demands. These are called work-related factors, which when not addressed can increase the risks of workplace stress or lead to poor workplace mental health. However, there are some simple ways to reduce these risks on your farm.

Most farmers are farming because they love it, even though it can be pretty stressful at times. You know that looking after safety and mental health is important – but there are times when safety practices can let us down. This can impact farm productivity as well as stress levels. It’s never you, until it is – so take steps early on, to prevent an injury from impacting you, your workers, or your family, on the farm. 

On-farm injuries, particularly severe ones, create two immediate, often long-lasting problems – what happens to the farm and, more importantly, what happens to the farmer?

Because the research^1,2 confirms the farmer’s recovery is often more emotional or mental health related rather than physical health-related, the implications can linger for years – even for life.

The injury, the recovery and the rehabilitation create a unique series of problems tied directly to the unique lifestyle of the man or woman on the land.

In many ways the farmer isn’t just the general of the business, the farmer is – especially in their own mind – the whole business.

So losing that direct control, daily input and decision making is bound to have impacts. Impacts starting the first time the injured farmer realises they have to ask for help – possibly for something as routine as eating to as invasive as using the toilet; and as disenfranchising as having to surrender the running of the farm to someone, anyone, else.

The Rural and Remote Health report It could have been a lot worse: the psychological effects of farm-related serious injury in Victoria, recognising the agriculture industry has one of the highest workplace injury and illness rates in Australia, says an evaluation of on-farm injuries found “49.4 per cent reported depressive and post-traumatic symptoms following an occupational injury”.

In a nutshell the outcome, even when the injured farmer realises things could have been a lot worse, such as being crippled for life, or dead, is too often an uphill mental health journey, every step affected by a potential minefield of post-traumatic stress disorder, acute stress disorder, depression and anxiety.

“Farming is acknowledged as a stressful occupation, with non-injured farmers already at an increased risk of significant psychological problems, including high levels of stress, symptoms indicative of depression and increased rates of suicide,” the report noted.

It would be hard to find a gloomier scenario but the very fact the triggers and responses have become so well identified and documented has created the opportunity for post-injury support to help not just the injured farmer – but also their family and wider support network – to better embrace the raft of services and specialists available to make the return to normal life, or as normal as possible, a tangible goal.

Each scenario differs, often depending on the period of recovery, and its financial, as well as physical and mental, cost and how each farmer and their family react will be as unique as the farmer’s life pre-accident.

Despite the reported importance of maintaining a pragmatic mindset for recovery, due to the severity and traumatic nature of their injuries, many participants experienced ongoing emotional impacts.

Helplessness has emerged as a prominent theme, often accompanied by frustration and grief for the loss of their pre-injury life on the farm.

I grieved the life I used to have – it made it hard to leave the house, even now, because some things remind me of my life before the accident (Farmer, spinal injury)*

In particular, farmers with an ongoing physical disability speak about an overall lack of independence experienced as a direct result of their injuries.

I struggled with losing all my independence – it was mentally very difficult to rely on others to help me, I felt useless. (Farmer, brain injury)*

In some cases, the accident trauma has a more profound psychological effect on the spouse or family member, for myriad reasons, including witnessing the incident or the immediate aftermath, fear for the health of the loved one, additional stressors such as caring for the injured, day-to-day running of the farm, and increased financial concerns. 

But these farmers are also an important resource; their experiences and perspectives could help develop educational and transitional support services from recovery back to working at a preinjury level, while ensuring farming production is sustainable during this period. Furthermore, farm safety programs can be enhanced by the engagement of farmers, such as participants in this study as advocates for improved farm safety practices.

Because narrative-based farm-safety messages show more positive reception – the health of the farm relies on the farmer being healthy.

Injuries on the farm can lead to stress, long-term health concerns and loss of income or even fatalities, so preventing them from happening is the best way of protecting your mental health. When it comes to running the family farm, investing in mental health initiatives is not only good for your family and workers, but it’s good for business too.

The NCFH is supporting farmers just like you to manage and respond to work-related risks that impact on workplace mental health – these are factors in your work that can affect an employee’s mental health and include high job demands, low job control, low role clarity and more. Strategies to manage these risk factors include planning ahead for any additional worker needs, matching tasks to the capabilities of individual staff, and giving regular feedback on a job well done.

Managing these factors, means decreasing the risk of work-related stress, which can prevent physical injury, mental injury or even both at the same time.
Find out more about being mentally safe on farm at www.farmerhealth.org.au/campfire.

1) Beattie, Jessica, Murray, Margaret, Mcleod, Candis, Pedler, Daryl, Gabbe, Belinda and Brumby, Susan 2018, What happens to the farm? Australian farmers’ experiences after a serious farm injury, Journal of agromedicine, vol. 23, no. 2, pp. 134-143, doi: 10.1080/1059924X.2017.1422836.

2) Murray M, Beattie J, McLeod C, Pedler D, Brumby SA, Gabbe B. ‘It could have been a lot worse’: the psychological effects of farm-related serious injury in Victoria. Rural Remote Health. 2019 Sep;19(3):5323. doi: 10.22605/RRH5323. Epub 2019 Sep 14. PMID: 31522511.

* quotes are paraphrased and modified to protect the identity of participants

Farmer Health eNews August 2022

Find out the latest from the National Centre for Farmer Health

• Get your tickets for the Farming a Brighter Future Symposium
• Help inform research around chemical usage on farms
• Help develop a website to support the friends and family of people with major depressive disorder
• Did you catch our Farm Safety Week webinar on farm safety culture?
• Wellness Wednesday

View the August 2022 eNews

Read past issues of eNews

Do you want to receive our eNews?

FREE suicide first aid training is still available for people in the Ballarat and Great South Coast areas.

As we respond to challenging times exacerbated by the COVID-19 crises, many people are experiencing increased levels of distress, isolation, sadness, and loneliness. Now more than ever, we need effective suicide prevention conversational skills.

That’s where LivingWorks START training comes in. In as little as one hour, this online interactive training program will give you the conversational skills and cues to recognise when someone is having thoughts of suicide or experiencing high levels of distress; this training gives you some techniques to connect through conversation which may in fact help to keep family, friends, co-workers, and others safe from suicide – Know the signs, find the words to have a conversation, it’s easy with the START program.

This training is FREE to anyone 15 years and over who reside in the Great South Coast or Greater Ballarat Regions.

Find out more and sign up here: https://form.jotform.com/221991192630860

Episode 13: “Why is succession planning so stressful?”

In this episode, Mike Krause from P2Pagri explains some of the processes and common pitfalls of farm succession planning. He shares tips and tricks on how to prevent stress and misunderstandings and how to maintain strong working and family relationships throughout.

Now streaming on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and here.

This podcast is part of the Primary Producer Knowledge Network led by the National Centre for Farmer Health to promote mentally healthy workplaces. Campfire, part of the Primary Producer Knowledge Network, was funded by the Victorian State Government’s WorkSafe WorkWell Mental Health Improvement Fund.

Win a pair of Peltor X5A Earmuffs!

Enter your details – and your guess – through the form above for your chance to win a pair of Peltor X5A Earmuffs!

The winner will be announced on Tuesday 2nd August.

Gippsland and Goulburn Murray Rural Report

18th July 2022 – The latest rural stories for Gippsland, Shepparton and Goulburn Murray regions, featuring Dr Jacquie Cotton discussing Agricultural Chemical Use Mapping.

New Study Seeks to Understand Agri-Chemical Usage Across Victorian Farms

Farmers are the frontline of the annual battle against weeds and pests – and chemicals remain a common line of defence.

There are more than 8000 pesticides alone registered for use in Australia and 75 percent of those are for agricultural settings.*

Where, despite a barrage of best practice – and then better practice – advice, training and certification, the full impact of chemicals on the health and wellbeing of people using them or living around them remains largely unknown.

Deakin University’s Centre for Regional and Rural Futures and the National Centre for Farmer Health are leading a project to map the types of agrichemicals currently used in Victoria.

The variety of chemicals available to, and used by, farmers needs to be more thoroughly understood and that means we’re asking farmers to help this new project – to help themselves.

Project lead Associate Professor Robert Faggian says research results will be geographically mapped and be shared with agricultural industry organisations to further support and inform their health and safety information, resources and initiatives for the farming community.

The National Centre for Farmer Health’s Dr Jacquie Cotton said, through our work with farmers over many years, we know that people have an interest in chemical safety, chemical use and how they might be impacting their health. 

The more farmers who contribute to the project, the better the information and the better the long-term benefits through industry awareness and education.

She says participation for farmers is a simple – and anonymous – 15-minute online survey.

“All you need to do is tell us your most frequently used agrichemicals. Your contribution and participation in this project will help inform a proactive approach to keeping farmers healthy, informed and safe,” Dr Cotton says. 

“By mapping the use of particular chemicals we can tailor education and initiatives, so farmers are supported to continue using agrichemicals on-farm without putting their health, or the health of others who live and work on farm, at risk,” she says.

Participation in this research project is voluntary and it will cover general agrichemical use and hygiene, PPE (personal protection equipment) practices and description of any injuries or illness experienced during the use of agrichemicals.

 Although they are armed with pesticides, herbicides and fertilisers, spending billions and billions of dollars on them every year, in the protection and management of pastures, crops and livestock, there is little record of what goes where and when on a farm-by-farm or region-by-region basis.

Deakin University’s Centre for Regional and Rural Futures and the National Centre for Farmer Health are leading this WorkSafe Victoria-funded project as chemicals are one of four focus areas in the Agriculture Strategy 2020-23.

For more information or to access the survey visit 

Contact: Dr Jacquie Cotton j.cotton@deakin.edu.au Ph: 55518585

Media Contact 
Annabelle Macgugan 
amacgugan@wdhs.net
0458517699 

Improving the Recipe for Farm Safety in Australia

We never want to talk in hindsight of what we could have done to be safer on the farm.

Dr Amity Latham, Research Assistant, farmer and panellist.

Watch the event

Join our farm safety researchers on Friday 22nd July, from 1 – 2pm, for an interactive webinar exploring farm safety culture in Australia.

The National Centre for Farmer Health (NCFH) aims to improve the health, wellbeing and safety of all farmers and agricultural workers across Australia. Farm Safety Week, under this year’s theme ‘Recipe for Averting Disaster’, brings with it the opportunity to share what we have learned this year, and to work with those in our industry to further understand the current culture of farm safety in Australia, where we need it to be, and what we can do to get there.

We have brought together three NCFH farm safety researchers – Dr. Amity Latham, Jessie Adams, and Dr. Jacquie Cotton – to discuss the current culture of farm safety in Australia, at an individual, community and industry level.

Register for this free webinar through the link. If you have any questions please email Annabelle via amacgugan@wdhs.net.

Read more about the work we do here www.farmerhealth.org.au.

Our Panellists

Dr. Amity Latham, Research Assistant

BApSc(NRM), MSAg, PhD

Living on a farm in Telangatuk East, Amity Latham is a grain grower and an early career researcher. She has a background in consulting, ministerially-appointed directorships, and tertiary and vocational teaching. Her career has been committed to working with agriculture-dependent communities, reflected in her Ph.D. research as she considered a Marxist perspective of farmers’ control over their production using technology. In March 2021 Amity joined the research team at the National Centre for Farmer Health. She has contributed to research in community resilience, measuring farm safety culture, and engineering solutions for safer agricultural plants.

Jessie Adams, Ph.D. Candidate

BPubHealth & HealthProm(Hons), BCom

Jessie completed a Bachelor of Public Health and Health Promotion (Hons) and a Bachelor of Commerce at Deakin University in 2017. Following this, Jessie made a move to Hamilton to work as a Research Assistant at the centre. In 2020, she commenced her Ph.D. focusing on child safety on farms, entitled Injury Risk and Safety Behaviours of Children on Victorian Farms. Growing up on a beef farm in northeast Victoria, Jessie is keen to help improve farming communities’ health, wellbeing, and safety. 

Dr. Jacquie Cotton, Research Fellow

BSc(AnimSc) (Hons), GCertHighEd, PhD

Jacquie is Lecturer and Researcher in Rural Health for Deakin University School of Medicine. She lectures and chairs the units HMF701 Agricultural Health and Medicine and HMF702 Healthy and Sustainable Agricultural Communities. She has completed a Graduate Certificate in Higher Education and is involved in developing curriculum and assessment within the Graduate Certificate of Agricultural Health and Medicine. She has multidisciplinary scientific and industry expertise, particularly translational research within human population health, occupational health and safety, agrichemical exposure, and culture/behaviour change. She is a member of the Victorian Farmsafe Australia committee and the recently formed Agriculture Safety Reference Group established by WorkSafe Victoria.

RawAg Podcast

SEASON 2 EP 1: DR ALISON KENNEDY – DIRECTOR OF THE NATIONAL CENTRE FOR FARM HEALTH

Alison is a Behavioural Scientist who has lived and worked in Victoria’s rural farming community for almost two decades. Her expertise in rural/farmer mental health and suicide prevention has drawn on a range of innovative techniques including digital interventions, digital storytelling, community education programs and peer support models. Alison has led numerous farmer mental health projects and continues to build the Centre’s capacity and reach by working collaboratively with researchers, farmers and industry stakeholders across Australia and internationally. Her expertise has been recognised through research awards, numerous advisory roles, peer review publication, international research consultation, invited presentations and expert witness testimony before the Royal Commission into Victoria’s Mental Health System. Alison is passionate about co-designing the Centre’s research, education and services in collaboration with community and industry—to ensure the Centre’s work continues to be effective, relevant and tailored to the needs of rural farming communities. Visit www.farmerhealth.org.au for more information.

Find out more about RawAg: RawAg Podcast – Te Mania Angus

Campfire podcast burns brighter for a much wider rural audience

The National Centre for Farmer Health’s digital meeting place for issues on the land – will now be available for listeners at any time.

NCFH Director, Dr Alison Kennedy says the Campfire series is expanding its podcast-based format starting late May.

She says the switch will maximise opportunities for farmers, farm workers and farming families to ‘plug in’ and listen anytime – maybe on a drive to a sale, in the shearing shed, in the tractor, relaxing at night or even last thing in bed before turning out the light – as long as it doesn’t compromise their safety.

“While our initial Campfire foray into podcasting has been a feature alongside some of our fortnightly scheduled online Q&A sessions, we have come to realise with all the cyberspace options available today, people love being able to access content at a time and place that works for them,” Dr Kennedy explained.

“That’s the feedback we have been receiving from participants so now our podcast conversations will be released fortnightly across Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Anchor, and the Farmer Health website,” she says.

“Making a much wider range of content so much more accessible.”

“Each podcast episode profiles a topic-relevant expert who explores how work-related factors can positively or negatively affect stress experienced by farmers and their employees.”

“We also look at how practical action can be taken to build a mentally-healthy workplace (which will also include handy links to further information and resources).”

Dr Kennedy says not only are podcast speakers topic experts, many of them are also farming experts, with irreplaceable “lived experience grappling with the issue at hand”.

She says the focus is on the prevention of stress and poor mental health and addressing the many factors which affect that – from the glaringly obvious to the more insidious, which can strike unexpectedly.

“You only have to look at some of the subjects we have covered to date, such as working effectively in a family business and strengthening your support team through to healthy ageing on the farm and strategies for preventing bullying in farm workplaces,” Dr Kennedy added.

“Every Campfire topic already presented will be available via our podcast library and that catalogue will be boosted by some of the topics already organised for the weeks ahead,” she says.

“Some of those are immediately topical, as they have been in the headlines lately, such as preventing crime on farm, from stock theft to machinery, equipment and firearms.

“Our soon to be released Campfire podcasts will also be taking a look at rural resilience and disaster prevention and learning how to not let your bias limit your farming potential.”

Find out more about being mentally safe on farm at www.farmerhealth.org.au/campfire.

Media Contact 
Annabelle Macgugan 
amacgugan@wdhs.net
0458517699