Editorial: Dairy visa woes set to ease
OPINION: Dairy farmers will be breathing easier thanks to the Government last month delivering a Christmas gift in the form of immigration reforms.
Federated Farmers president Wayne Langford says while people are opening about mental health, there’s still disproportionately high rates of suicide and depression in rural communities.
“As a country, and as a farming sector, we desperately need to move the conversation beyond just talking about it,” says Langford.
“We need to do something to change the trajectory of those statistics.
His comments come as the country marked mental health awareness week from September 22-29.
Langford the farming sector has recently presented a rural mental health strategy to the Government and wants them to work with Feds to both fund and implement it.
“This strategy is the result of significant collaboration between all those in the rural sector, including Young Farmers, Rural Women, Federated Farmers and the levy bodies.”
Langford says the foundation of this strategy would essentially see a single pool of money go into a contestable fund to make sure it gets to where it’s needed most, with accountability for those results overseen by those in the rural sector.
“At the moment, there’s a lot of good stuff going on to improve rural mental health, with the likes of Rural Support Trust, Farmstrong, and Surfing for Farmers – and we want to see that continue.
“The new strategy is about building on that good work, co-funding projects that make a difference, and ensuring there’s high-level oversight and coordination across the country to make sure we’re hitting the right spots.
“We’ll be pushing the Government to get this across the line so that when next year’s Mental Health Awareness Week comes around, we’re not just talking about the problem, but we’ll have proactive solutions in action.”
Langford acknowledges that when it comes to talking about mental health, the country has come a long way in recent years.
“It wasn’t long ago it was almost viewed as a dark and shameful thing that nobody would ever own up to,” he says.
The first phase of a Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) investigation into allegations of mistreatment of sheep connected to shearing practices has been completed.
According to Biosecurity New Zealand, legal controls on the movement of fruit and vegetables in the South Auckland suburb of Papatoetoe will remain in place until mid-February.
The rollout of the New Zealand Genetic Evaluation Version 6 is said to mark a step-change in the depth and breadth of genetic information available to both stud and commercial sheep breeders.
With low wool prices, farmer interest in the self-shedding Wiltshire sheep continues to grow.
OPINION: Dairy farmers will be breathing easier thanks to the Government last month delivering a Christmas gift in the form of immigration reforms.
Arable growers are being invited to supply samples of their harvested crops as part of a project which uses an alternative approach to determining how well they are managing their biggest input - fertiliser.
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