Farmer and Advisor Engagement in Occupational Safety and Health

Farming is one of the most dangerous occupations in Ireland with one third of workplace fatalities occurring in the sector. There is a need to increase farmer and farm advisor engagement with occupational safety and health (OSH). Farm advisors have an advantage in being familiar with their farmer clients and the farmers’ individual circumstances which allows the advisors to communicate with the farmer in a way that encourages OSH change. This study sought to devise a suite of support materials to assist advisors in raising and discussing OSH issues with farmers in ways that integrate health and safety with overall farm management advice provision. As there are a wide range of topics which farm OSH encompasses, this study focused on ‘key problem areas’ identified by farm advisors. The study sample comprised 10 Teagasc dairy and drystock advisors and 10 dairy and drystock discussion groups (120 farmers) from the study catchment area. Interviews were conducted with the farm advisors before, during and post intervention. Questionnaire surveys were administered pre and post-intervention to the 120 farmers in the discussion groups. These farm advisor interviews and farmer surveys were used to measure pre-intervention engagement levels with OSH and gauge a change in engagement in OSH post intervention. The study found that livestock, machinery, livestock handling facilities and time management were key OSH-related problem areas on dairy and drystock farms in the studied area. The study produced a set of bespoke OSH advisory support materials (checklists, newsletters, prompt sheets, calendars and videos) addressing the ‘key problem areas’ that attempted to increase farmer and advisor engagement in OSH and that could be used easily and regularly by farmers and advisors. For the advisors and farmers involved in this study, farmer discussion groups were found to be the most common setting in which OSH was brought up. OSH was also discussed on a one-to-one basis between the farmer and advisor depending on the individual farmer, the issues they may have in relation to OSH and their level of engagement with OSH. Having a range of materials available to the farm advisors allowed them to prepare more easily for meetings with farmers and include appropriate OSH messages. Experience sharing between farmers was found to be an important contributor to OSH awareness and communication as it encouraged active discussion between farmer and advisors. Discussion groups play a role in supporting this type of peer experience sharing. Farmers were found to be positive to OSH inclusion when the OSH messages were short and included regularly by the advisor (‘little and often’ approach) rather than having occasional lengthy OSH meetings. The ten advisors stated that they would use the developed support materials if provided to them again. Both farmers and advisors reported increased levels of OSH engagement due to the study intervention. The study recommends that OSH should be included as a standard work plan item for all advisors and treated as a core element of their communication with farmers. Experience sharing should be encouraged in order to increase active discussion in relation to OSH. The ‘little and often’ approach should be used for communication and information dissemination for OSH. Communication campaigns for farm OSH should use a range of materials that are season and enterprise specific and adaptable to varying situations. Further research should be conducted on developing and testing targeted communication support materials to increase engagement with ‘key OSH problem areas’ identified in this study and ensure relevance to the target audiences.