Mr. Vincent Nally:

I will explain a little bit about the mentor programme. Irish Rural Link was asked to be represented on the farm safety partnership. For my sins, I was chosen. Initially, I did not realise the importance and weight that sat on my shoulders. Even though I was farming myself, I did not realise what was happening on farms.

Irish Rural Link examined what input we could make and developed what was probably the first ever bottom-up approach to farm safety, one which triggered farmers to become involved and part of the process. We decided to recruit a number of farmers for a programme by trying to give them something. We delivered a train the trainer course with a farm focus. The course is capacity building and aimed at giving farmers the skills they need to communicate the message. It has been very successful in terms of outcomes and achievements. We ended up with 13 active inventors on the ground, all of whom were ordinary farmers who would speak to fellow farmers. They have delivered big in terms of outcomes. The programme was delivered in four midland counties, which together are considered a blackspot. While the use of statistics can be difficult, it should be noted that only one of the 29 deaths last year was recorded in the mentor programme area.

The focus of the programme was to train farmers to target fellow farmers. They utilised media such as discussion groups, marts, agricultural shows and other large shows in the catchment area and used different ideas to target farmers. One particular initiative, which was widely discussed, was generated from an idea from farmers themselves. It involved securing a discounted offer from a local provider of dry shaft covers. The importer and local distributor offered a purchasing group of 100 farmers a dry shaft cover for €5 in return for promotion among at least four friends and neighbours. When the importer called me to say he had a problem with the programme, I thought I was in trouble. The problem, however, was that his stores were empty of covers because the initiative had been a sell-out success.

The process produced a number of worthwhile ideas from farmers. We were capitalising on the peer-to-peer approach. There is great empathy among farmers who share many of their ideas and we capitalised on this in the programme. Among the ideas that emerged were an improved calving gate design and the use of retractable spikes for loaders. The most worthwhile idea, about which the committee will hear more in future, is an invention that removes the dangerous gas, hydrogen sulfide, from slurry. It involves using a retrofit slat that has been worked on with an engineering company. This invention has the potential to make slurry gas safe and provide an energy source for farmers. It could have significant environment benefits in terms of treating slurry in a low temperature unit. We are working on this device as we speak and have taken out a patent on it. We hope to develop the idea with funders in the next few weeks.

It was unbelievable what emerged when farmers came together and engaged on the topic of safety. Farmers share many ideas on grass management and breed improvement. They need to include safety in their vocabulary and day-to-day communications with each other. Irish Rural Link is pleased to have an opportunity to address the committee on this issue. I emphasise the need for better supports and a bottom-up approach, which has never been tried before. We heard today about a carrot-and-stick approach. Surely farmers should be supported on an issue such as this. We had efforts to save bats, birds and bees with GLAS and the rural environment protection and agri-environment options schemes, yet support has never been provided for a farm safety initiative. Farmers must be involved in the process and better supports must be provided for bottom-up initiatives that trigger attitudinal and behavioural change. This is the common denominator that is not being triggered.

We hope the pilot could be looked at as a model that should be mainstreamed and supported. The farmers who got involved in this did so gratis. I see the network that has evolved from the process and I feel it has significant potential to be mainstreamed. Hopefully, this message is communicated here today.