Support essential to reap health benefits of care farm movement
Change in attitudes needed for growth
FINANCIAL BARRIERS and a lack of public understanding need to be addressed if the full potential of using farms to rehabilitate people and nurture their wellbeing is to be realised, said a leading Yorkshire care farmer.
Botton Social Farm near Danby in the North York Moors is one of a small cluster of fully fledged care farms operating in Yorkshire, providing placements for people with a range of disabilities or disadvantages to improve their mental and physical health through working on the land.
Its farm care manager Robin Asquith said he believes there is massive untapped potential to use care farming to boost health and wellbeing, but that affordability and public awareness is currently holding this back.
Plans are afoot to dramatically grow the sector, with social farming seen by some health professionals as an ideal way to embrace social prescribing, whereby patients are referred to third-party services for practical and emotional support.
Such prescriptions are viewed vital to reduce growing pressures on the NHS.
Later this month, on November 26, a Growing Care Farming project will be launched at Askham Bryan College near York in an attempt to stimulate the growth in therapeutic care farming across the county.
Mr Asquith said: “It’s got massive potential because there are lots of different groups of people who can benefit, from people with learning disabilities to people who suffer from substance misuse, mental health problems, dementia and post-traumatic stress.
“It works because it is real. It is set on a real farm not in a day centre. People can learn real skills and jobs.”
The Growing Care Farming project was launched in London in May. It is run by the Social Farms & Gardens and Thrive charities, is funded by the Department for Education, supported by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and managed by Natural England.
Over the next three years, the project’s engagement work will be rolled out to another eight regions of the country.
Its stated aim is to “transform the scale of the care farming sector across England”, creating opportunities for people with a “defined need” to benefit from health, social and specialist educational care services in farming, growing or horticulture settings.
Mr Asquith agrees that care farming should be more widely embraced but he warned: “There needs to be more understanding, particularly from the general public.
Care Farm Manager Robin Asquith in Ainthorpe near Danby.
“Social prescription is more widely available now and farms provide a real opportunity for people.”
Funding also needs to be addressed if more care farms are to open, he added. “Each individual that comes to our farm is privately funded, whether it is through
disability allowance or out of their own funds, and it can be quite a challenge for some people, especially now that we work with people with dementia.
“We typically have 12 people a day and we are seeing more and more demand, so much so that we are getting to the point now
where we are looking at whether to open on a second site.”
The Growing Care Farming launch event at Askham Bryan College is free to attend for anyone interested in increasing opportunities for care farming in Yorkshire. To book a place, email rso@farmgarden.org.uk