When you hear people talk about sustainable agriculture what comes to mind??? Most people think of good stewardship and preserving the land. I challenge you to think about it as farm safety. If you consider that the youth of today are the producers of tomorrow it is easy to see the importance of farm safety. It is our responsibility to be teaching our youth farm safety today so they can become the producers of tomorrow.
The National Ag Safety Database says, “an estimated 104 children younger than 20 years of age are fatally injured from agricultural injuries on the U.S. farms and ranches annually.” Most of those injuries are machinery and drowning related incidents. To put that into perspective, every three days a child dies in an agriculture related incident. Of on farm working youth fatalities 25% involved machinery, 17% motor vehicles, and 16% were drownings. While this seems to be a staggering number it is hard to imagine how many non-fatal injuries occur each year that never get reported.
While everyone thinks, “not on my farm.” A major farm accident is only a blink of an eye away. As machinery gets larger and larger blind spots and visibility becomes more of an issue. As atv’s and side by sides become more common, youth have more access. As we work with our youth side by side, I challenge all farmers to think of sustainability, think of farm safety.
