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Farmers unite to fight stress

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Serena Kirby, Denmark Bulletin

David Wright was named as the Inaugural Denmark Cattle Farmer of the Year at the recent Drought Muster Buster held at The Dam.

David is a longstanding farmer who has built up his cattle enterprise to be one of the biggest in the region.

The award was part of a broader event organised by Raintree Farm owner Steve Birkbeck, who wanted to create ‘a reason to celebrate in a time of stress and trouble for the farming industry’.

“This will be an annual award and we’ve already had feedback suggesting that we extend the award’s parameters to cover all of the Great Southern,” Steve said.

An integral part of the event was the discussion of issues surrounding bushfires by a panel of local experts.

Included were issues surrounding preparedness and psychologist Emily Harper spoke about research results that revealed the negative impact of bushfire trauma on children and babies and even on babies in utero.

“Research shows these children have worse outcomes in terms of their health, their mental health, their education, and their likelihood of getting a job after they leave school, than kids who didn’t go through a catastrophic fire,” Emily said.

“There’s also a lot of research that’s gone into what we do about this and we’ve learnt that the more we can get kids involved and informed in their family’s emergency plan, the better the outcomes are.

“We need to ensure that the first time they see a fire truck isn’t when it’s rolling up with a fire behind it.”

L-R: Cattle Farmer Of The Year David Wright with local farmer Kevin Hard; DFES acting district officer Cameron Famlonga and Shire councillor Clare Campbell.
Photos: Serena Kirby.

Key points from the panel were the importance of up-skilling the community and improving communication and collaboration as good relationships get the best results.

A second panel discussion covered issues facing the farming community.

Feeding livestock during drought or disaster were hot topics as too as was the difficulty many farmers experienced when trying to access Government rebates, grants and other relief funding in times of need.

Panel members believed that streamlining the means testing and eligibility process would assist farmers.

Panel member Geoff Pearson urged farmers to look at extending dams and bores and securing their fodder supplies for the future rather than waiting until there was an emergency.

Bonnie Ravenhill said farmers should create cash reserves to feed animals when the price of fodder went up or when feed was required for longer periods.

Denmark Bulletin 12 September 2024

See all the photos in the issue.
This article appeared in the Denmark Bulletin, 12 September 2024.

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