Ensuring employees’ health

Last week my colleague Sean Maskill wrote about the obligations farm owners and managers have to ensure the mental health of employees, contractors and other workers.

Farmers are not psychologists or doctors. Nevertheless, farm owners can take steps to identify and eliminate or minimise risks to mental health.

For example, fatigue is a potential risk to mental health. Farm owners need to ensure fatigue is eliminated or minimised (so far as reasonably practicable). This is easier said than done when tolerance to fatigue varies.

The risk of fatigue can be minimised by taking steps like agreeing on working a maximum number of consecutive days, maximum daily hours and consistent rest breaks. Make sure your workers have regular meals and drinking water.

These steps are all the more important when the worker is in the field from dusk till dawn during calving.

Identifiable signs of fatigue include tiredness, slow responses, moodiness and poor concentration. If a worker shows any of these signs, asking them how they are feeling and if they need a break are good first steps. If lighter work is needed, this could be provided as an alternative until the worker is no longer showing signs of fatigue. If those preventative steps are unsuccessful, the farm owner could consider arranging a relief worker to allow the worker time to recover.

Although stopping work or taking breaks will slow production in the short term, long-term it can have the opposite effect. If a worker has no regular breaks or meaningful rest, their work rate will eventually slow, they will make more mistakes, and their risk of depression increases.

Engaging a temporary worker could be the difference between a decent worker remaining an asset or becoming a liability.

Of course, farm workers must also take reasonable care for their own health and safety.

Workers should be getting a good night’s sleep on work nights, eating an adequate diet and drinking plenty of water.

If a worker is still showing signs of fatigue after you have taken preventative steps, it could come down to their lifestyle outside of work. It may be worth asking about their sleep and diet patterns.

Advising them to try to get eight hours of sleep, lay off the booze and have a decent breakfast in the morning could help them turn the situation around.

Support organisations like the Rural Support Trust, can help farm owners and workers develop strategies to manage mental health risks.

Similarly, farmers can take advantage of the GoodYarn workshop series, which helps rural professionals and farmers understand mental health, and provides tips on how to stay healthy, recognise stress in others and respond effectively.

❚ Lawyers and legal executives from Auld Brewer Mazengarb & McEwen write about legal topics affecting farmers. The content of this article is necessarily general and readers should seek specific advice and not rely solely on what is written here. For further information, please contact Auld Brewer Mazengarb & McEwen. This column was prepared by Jesse Lang who can be contacted by emailing jesse.lang@abmm.co.nz.