Virginia Western’s Dr. David Berry and Dr. Mallory White participated in a Safe Farm Steward training this summer in Tennessee. This program recognizes farms for safe farm practices and helps identify equipment that could pose a future hazard, helping ensure safer agricultural production.
The federally funded Safe Farm Steward Project is supported by the Southeast Center for Agricultural Safety and Injury Prevention and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.
Over 200 farms across the Southeast United States have already been certified. Virginia Western Community College is the only institution in Virginia to complete this training and earn the ability to certify local farms. Students help with the certification process, and they completed some certifications last fall.
According to the project, agriculture ranks among the nation’s most dangerous occupations, with more than 19 deaths per 100,000 workers. The large equipment used in agriculture, construction and forestry present many of the dangers inherent to farming, so the program’s focus is to teach safety and recognize efforts to improve agricultural safety. Thus the certification is not that a farm is safe, but that the farm is making a conscious effort to adhere to safe practices.
“If a farmer gets injured, it can halt farm production, putting families in a bad situation. The goal of this program is to get folks to think about safety more often, and it really works,” said White. “After participating in this program, I found myself consciously thinking about safety more often around tractors and other large equipment while farming this summer than I previously had.”
Dr. Stacy Vincent, a professor of agricultural education at the University of Kentucky, is one of the project’s principal investigators. In a video, he noted that the project will review at least 3,000 farms and at least 20,000 pieces of equipment over the five years of the project. The project is in its third year, and is ramping up farm certifications in states across the Southeast United States.
Do you know a farm that wants to become a Certified Safe Farm Steward? Nominate a farmer or have someone help fill out an application for your own farm to become a Certified Safe Farm Steward. Learn more at safefarmsteward.org, or fill out a form to begin the application process here: https://forms.gle/DT53Hz5hXCdu4rQj8
