In this issue Bernard Holloway previews a new Practical Sheep, Goat and Alpaca regular series: ‘Health & Safety’. Even smaller farmers and smallholders with older tractors need to take care to avoid accidents and we aim to give you some pointers.
Farming has the worst health and safety record of all industries in this country. I’m sure we all agree that this is an unenviable, indeed untenable, situation. Regarding my own background, I spent more than 40 years in construction and was very much in the vanguard of the implementation of ‘The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 1994’ when they were introduced, and they have been regularly reviewed since.
The regulations were introduced to govern the way construction projects were designed and managed from conception until completion, identifying and hopefully eliminating poor working practices, through design, and methods of construction, aiming to control, reduce and perhaps even eliminate accidents. This was achieved through drawing up method statements for each specific operation and assessing the risk.
This way of looking at what needed to be done was channelled down through the construction team to those actually undertaking the works. Many reading this are probably familiar with this, or similar legislation. Inevitably, most of us ‘old hands’ saw this initially as an unnecessary and unwelcome intrusion from E.U. bureaucrats who, we felt, should stick to running governments and leave us ‘experts’ to get on with running the industry. How wrong we were!
Over time, we began to see the benefits of working to a clearly thought out work regime. The method statements, risk assessments, site inductions and training, became concepts that were no longer foreign. Fatalities and injuries began to fall. Who wouldn’t like to see a similar reduction in farming? I realise that it is not possible to import a method of working that has shown dramatic improvements in safety from one industry to another but some elements are transferable.
Denne historien er fra Winter 2016/2017-utgaven av Sheep Goats and Alpacas.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Denne historien er fra Winter 2016/2017-utgaven av Sheep Goats and Alpacas.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent? Logg på
What About Bees On A Smallholding? Designing The Apiary
Claire Waring considers how to arrange your hives
The Boer Goat Looks, Personality And Great Meat!
At the start of her own Boer goat enterprise, Jack Smellie talks to several existing producers and explains why Boers and their meat have so much to offer, as well as gaining valuable advice for newbies such as herself……
Duck Or Drake?
It depends on when you want to know says Chris Ashton
Handling Alpacas
Practical suggestions from Joy Whitehead
Keeping Lambs
We were lucky, we hadn’t been looking, well we had, but not seriously and this property just crept up on us.
Smallholding In France
The end of what had been feeling like an endless summer, arrived with a bit of a shock, with early November temperatures suddenly falling from the high 20’s, to the surprise of waking up to a light frost.
Wool And Fleece In Winter?
Although the main shearing season for sheep is from May to September across the UK, there is plenty of fleece being harvested at other times of year.
New Year Resolutions
Jessica Wombwell looks at improvement ideas to stick to
Rearing Your Own Christmas Dinner
The project will be both challenging and rewarding says Janice Houghton-Wallace
The Moult Is A Natural Process
Jessica Wombwell explains why there is feather loss in poultry