The Farmers4Safety – Managing Risk Together EIP-Agri Project (F4S) aimed to highlight the essential role and value of the ‘peer-to-peer’ mentoring approach in tackling and improving the social standards around farm safety, health, and wellbeing.
Lead partner, Irish Rural Link (IRL), established the peer-to-peer mentoring concept as a viable and successful precedent based on results from a previous Farm Safety Mentor Programme, also lead by IRL. The F4S project aimed to expand on these results in three additional counties, which were not included in the previous project through partnering with the BRIDE project in Cork, the Duncannon Blue Flag Farming & Communities Scheme in Wexford, and the New Futures Farming Group in Tipperary.
As part of the peer-to-peer mentoring programme within F4S, 6 part-time mentors were identified, each being part of these existing partner farming networks. By using train the trainer methodology, the mentors helped to create and adopt a peer-to-peer mentoring approach. This enabled F4S to support effective farmer-to-farmer engagement, communication and knowledge transfer throughout the farming communities on matters relating to mental health, farm health and safety.
In addition, workshops, presentations, and talks were hosted through the mentors on topics tailored to the identified needs of the focus areas. Through successful delivery of the core peer-to-peer principles, the project raised awareness on farms regarding health, safety and wellbeing. The project also introduced the focus communities to practical ways of addressing the identified challenges and signposting them to available supports.
F4S project mentors also created regional WhatsApp groups to operate as a Buddy System approach. These buddy systems enabled farming participants to keep up to date with upcoming local events and trainings available while also providing an opportunity to embed a collaborative approach to farm safety, health and wellbeing through farmers linking with each other.
The Buddy System allowed participants to directly reach out to peers for assistance and advice during busy periods or during tasks with high hazards or safety risks to ensure safer practices, such as helping with animal handling. This created safer environments for farmers while also benefiting their health and wellbeing from social interaction, with an ethos of helping each other.
With farmers being more likely to be comfortable sharing with other farmers, the Buddy System has potential to be implemented on a wider scale to collectively manage risks in farming communities. It creates an environment for the farming community to feel comfortable in giving their views, opinions, and experiences to a peer, rather than an individual in a perceived position of authority. The Buddy System is one of the initiatives that has continued post-project, with the WhatsApp project still being a resource for farmers to share insights and supports. The F4S project team have designed a range of publications which were shared and distributed to relevant stakeholders, including farmers and farm families through all platforms. All these publications can be found in the appendices section or on the Farmers4Safety website.
More recently, The Farm Safety Community Champions initiative was founded, inspired by the 2022 ‘Farmers4Safety Managing Risk Together’ EIP AGRI project. Adopting a ‘peer-to-peer’ mentoring and champion approach to engage farmers in attitudinal and behavioural change towards farm safety by tackling and improving the social norms around farm safety and emotional wellbeing.
Particular attention will be given to the needs of older farmers through a focused element of the project called ‘The Farmers’ Haggard’. This project will empower communities, farmers, and farm families to take steps to improving behaviours and attitudes towards farm safety and support a sustained approach to wellbeing and access to farm work relief and help.
You can find out more about the Farmers4Safety project and the Farm Safety Community Champions Initiative at: Home | Farm Safety Community Champions
