Utah Farm Bureau Gearing Up for May, Mental Health Awareness Month

May 01, 2024

Studies show that farmer suicide rates are several times higher than the national average. Jessica Cabrera, managing director of member engagement with the American Farm Bureau Federation, says mental health among farmers and ranchers is an important topic.

"There are just so many unpredictable experiences in farming, experiences such as natural disasters, lots of financial uncertainty, fluctuating markets, labor shortages, trade disruptions. There's so many factors that contribute to extreme stress for farmers and ranchers," Cabrera said. "And they also often live in a very isolated setting, which can compound the issue. I think it's really important to break the stigma around mental health challenges."

If you or someone you know is struggling, the Farm State of Mind website has many resources to help.

"You'll find a national resource directory that is searchable. You'll find helpful tips like how to help someone in emotional pain or how to start a conversation with someone. We have videos, including video and radio public service announcements," Cabrera said. "We have a peer-to-peer support community resource called Togetherall. That resource offers a space for farm family members ages 16 and older a way to express themselves anonymously and to receive and give peer support."

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Video: Western Canadian Agriculture: Hard Times Made the World's Best Farmers

Western Canadian agriculture produced the most advanced farmers in the world not through abundance but through adversity. The crow rate fell. The wheat price went nowhere. The brown envelopes stopped.

When the subsidies disappeared, the bad farmers left and the good ones stayed. And the ones who stayed could not just grow wheat anymore. They started growing lentils and canola and peas and flax and faba beans. They built crop rotation. They got serious about agronomy because there was no government backstop. That process produced the Western Canadian agriculture Dennis Bulani describes in this clip: the most advanced, most educated farming culture in the world.

His contrast with Iowa corn and soybean farmers is sharp. At a DeKalb farmer meeting in Okoboji, Iowa, he asked what crop rotation they ran. Beans on corn stubble, corn on bean stubble. How do you fertilize? The co-op agronomist handles it. Have you considered other crops? No need. We make so much money on corn and soybeans. Western Canadian agriculture was never allowed that comfort. And now those Iowa farmers are watching soybean markets lock up with China and corn prices slide, and they do not have the agronomy knowledge or the research base to pivot. Western Canadian farmers adapted on a dime because they had done it before.

Dennis also makes the case that Western Canadian agriculture keeps adapting in real time. Low commodity prices over the past year have pushed growers to look seriously at precision spot-spray technology. He knows a neighbor who bought a sprayer with the seeing-eye system and sprayed only 80 out of 320 acres. As a chemical retailer Dennis acknowledges that will affect his sales. He supports it anyway, because if it advances Canadian agriculture and makes farmers money, that is a good outcome.

The lesson Dennis draws from the tale of two farms: continuous improvement is the only durable strategy. When canola was $22 a bushel some growers went to Arizona instead of the Crop Production Show. When the price came down those same growers came back to the research and the discipline. Products do not go on Rack Petroleum's shelves unless they pass a replicated trial first. That is what Western Canadian agriculture built through hard times: farmers who do the work whether the times demand it or not.

Dennis Bulani is CEO of Rack Petroleum and Ultimate Yield in Biggar, Saskatchewan. Dan Aberhart hosts GTF Productions, Western Canadian Agriculture's foremost live briefing platform and its foremost AI training platform for ag operators