We need a drastic change of mindset to tackle the safety risks that blight farming

At the beginning of March, I planned to write an editorial around how lucky the sector was during Covid-19 in that it was continuing uninterrupted as the weather improved in spring.

Without doubt, being on self-contained farms is a near-perfect form of selfisolation – work continues and the need to travel off farm is minimal.

And I wrote that with more children involved in farm activities, people should pause and think about the risks and dangers of farming.

However, a farm fatality the day before made me pause and question if it was insensitive to a bereaved family. I decided it was.

But four farming-related accidents over the past week mark what has to be one of the worst weeks for farm accidents ever and it’s time to speak up.

The four incidents are terrible tragedies and we would like to express our condolences to each of the families involved. The general concerns set out below do not specifically relate to any of those individual terrible losses but neither can that loss of life keep us silent on how we need to respond to this issue as a farming community.

There has been a systemic lack of leadership across the board on this issue and that includes the media too. Everyone in the sector probably has a story of a near miss: the tractor that could only be stopped by letting down the transport box or the elderly parents climbing on roofs or up ladders to do ‘necessary’ work.

If we agree that many of these deaths are preventable, then we are failing to take meaningful action.

Tractor tests

Farmers and their representatives have fought tooth and nail against new regulations such as the proposal for NCT-like tractor tests. Why is it that ensuring tractors are roadworthy is not a good thing? It’s a simple measure, that might cost a farmer financially, but who wouldn’t choose that cost over the cost of a human life?

For too long policy in this area has been more carrot than stick. It’s not working and it’s time it changed.

Farming leaders need to step up and say too many people are being killed on Irish farms.

Do we think and accept that farming is a dangerous business and some deaths are to be expected? No other sector would think so.

And our collective attitude in the sector needs to change and the change must in turn affect how we all behave.

That would really be a way to honour the memory of those we have lost.