Lack of mental health support in rural Ireland, study finds

The greatest barrier to improving mental health issues in the farming community is the shortage of services in rural Ireland — according to a research project by three transition year students from Laois.

Aoibhe Foyle, Lucy-jane Burke and Rachel Heffernan from Mountmellick Community School were inspired by a 2023 research paper from UCD’S School of Agriculture and Food Science and the School of Psychology that found that 25pc of Irish farmers are at risk of suicide.

“It was a difficult conversation,” Rachel says of the investigation, which was entered in the annual Irish Angus Schools Competition.

“All three of our dads are farmers. We know ourselves how lonely it can be. They leave at 6.0 in the morning and might come back at 6.0 in the evening.

It’s a constant worry — they’re always worried and anxious about what’s going on in the farm. It doesn’t matter where they are, the farm is always on their minds.

“We spoke to around 15 farmers. We have teachers working with Macra na Feirme who connected us with farmer groups. The main thing we took away from our conversations with them is the lack of services in rural Ireland.

“During our research, we found that the IFA has a lot of helplines for farmers but not enough actual support to offer them practically.

“We also found that most farmers were reluctant to speak about their issues.”

In October, the students worked with their teachers to introduce ‘Wear Your Wellies Day’ in their school to promote awareness about the mental health of farmers.

“In our school, we host ‘Funky Shoe Day’ to promote the importance of mental health awareness,” says Lucy-jane.

“So after everything we learnt about farmers, we asked our teacher if we could focus on them. We have a huge Ag community in our school — most of us come from the country and are surrounded by farm life. Other students loved the idea and came in their best wellies to school.”

The girls’ project also investigated questions of sustainability and how a more environmentally sound direction in farming could help the community adapt and in turn, support their mental health.

“We originally wanted to look at just the mental health of farmers. But we realised that it’s connected — we looked at what would make life on a farm easier,” says Rachel.

“Farming is under pressure and it’s important to look at better, more sustainable options to help get through that.”

She also stressed the importance of improving the dialogue around mental health.

“It has to be simple for people to understand. If you don’t reason with farmers, listen to them and have them on your side, there’s no way of moving forward.

“People are getting better, especially younger farmers, they’re aware of what’s happening. And they are willing to listen as long as they are being listened to.”