Yellow Wellies and NFYFC create new mental health package

The National Federation of Young Farmers’ Clubs (NFYFC) and the Farm Safety Foundation are offering further mental health support for young people in agriculture.

The new course builds on existing training offered by the two organisations, and aims to give young farmers the confidence to know when to ask others if they are OK, how to talk about mental health, and where to refer people for help.

See also: How farmers can deal with mental health at times of pressure

The programme has been designed so that Young Farmers Clubs (YFCs) across England and Wales can easily deliver the training during meetings.

NFYFC recently updated its Rural+ course to focus it more on managing mental wellbeing and redeveloped the farm safety Curve module.

Learning and development manager Natasha Dennis said: “Following feedback, we have tried to make the Curve modules easier to run during club meetings by reducing the amount of information shared in a single module.

“By adding the Mind Your Head module to our training offer, it meant we could remove this content from the farm safety module and dedicate a whole session to the important topic of mental health with more of a focus on farming.

“All of the Curve modules can be delivered by YFC trainers who know and understand the YFC environment. The sessions are meant to be engaging and interactive – ideal for a club meeting.”

Farm Safety Foundation manager Stephanie Berkeley added: “We are proud to work with NFYFC to improve both our farm safety and mental health Curve modules. We need to improve the attitudes and behaviours around risk-taking and poor mental health in farming and the next generation are the key to driving better behaviours and attitudes.”