New website urges Island farmers to discuss mental health
/by Kathy Birt
The P.E.I. Department of Agriculture and Land launched a new website – www.farmerstalk.ca – on Jan. 30 to help farmers, their family members, and others in the industry access mental health information and resources.
“Crop scouts saw signs of farmers under stress and that started the conversation,” Agriculture and Land Minister Bloyce Thompson said recently. “This FarmersTalk.ca site is the result of hard work from my department.”
The website includes information on how to recognize signs of chronic stress and suicide in oneself and others, coping mechanisms, resources for those experiencing mental health issues, and testimonial videos.
The website is part of P.E.I.’s Farmer Assistance Program, which is a service that provides confidential, professional counselling services to Island farmers and their families.
Himself a lifelong dairy farmer, Thompson said he’s seen first-hand mental health issues in other farmers. “I knew a couple of farmers who committed suicide and I feel that I’m now in a position where I could do something about it,” he said.
Former P.E.I. hog producer Donald MacDonald agreed to appear in a video that can be found on the FarmersTalk.ca site as his way of reaching out to hopefully make a difference. In the video, he discusses a farming friend who was struggling with a downturn in the hog industry.
“I knew this farmer pretty well,” MacDonald recalled. “He came up to the farm every two to three weeks to buy wiener pigs. We had that same routine. One day, we were loading pigs. He made the comment, ‘I’m in this until I die.’”
The next day, MacDonald heard that the man had taken his own life. “I thought when he made that comment, he meant his own natural death,” he said. “I never thought of suicide.”
MacDonald farmed hogs from 1982 until 2016 when he sold his farm to Scott Dingwell of Hometown Pork in Mount Stewart. He stayed on as farm manager.
He noted that the closure of the Natural Organic Food Group (NOFG) pork processing plant in 2008 hurt a lot of Island farmers. “We had 325 producers in 1999, and by 2015 there was just 15 to 20,” said MacDonald. “Some had other commodities, and some got out of farming altogether.”
While he admits he’s retirement age, he said he’s quite content to stay on as the hog farm’s manager, with an eye to world events that can and do affect Island producers.
“All this business with the arrest of that Chinese woman (Huawei finance chief Meng Wanzhou) in December 2018 has caused a big drop in hog prices,” said MacDonald. “China put tariffs on Canadian pork and that affects the price right to the farm gate in P.E.I.”
Thompson said such situations are examples of how world events are out of farmers’ control. “No matter how good a job you do, trade deals, tariffs can shut down commodities that are crucial to the farmers’ livelihood,” he said. “There are so many factors in farming that are out of your control. You invest everything in the spring and there’s no guarantees that in the fall things will work out.”
While politics is now taking up the bulk of his time, Thompson said he’s very much in tune with what could happen when Mother Nature doesn’t cooperate. He said a farmer could be employing as many as 15 people and all those jobs are at stake if the farmer has a bad year.
“It’s not just the farmer and his family that have to be fed,” he said. “All those families have to be fed, so a farmer has to be a good financial manager, a conservationist, agrologist, an expert veterinarian, do human resources, we wear so many hats.”
Although Thompson’s farm is now in trust, he said he still goes to the barn at 5:30 a.m. every day he’s home.
“I have gotten used to getting up that early all my life,” said Thompson, adding that there are similarities between farming and politics. “When you open the barn door each day, you don’t know what you’ll walk into. You are a decision-maker in farming. You are always making decisions that affect your livelihood. The same thing could be said about politics.”
He said farmers are born to be tough and resilient. “But at the end of the day, it’s a fact that eventually it wears on you,” said Thompson. “Farmers are human and can get into dark places and feel there is no way out. If this website saves one person and/or helps to end the stigma (of mental health issues), it has done the work we set out to do.”
The numbers for P.E.I.’s Farmer Assistance Program, which fielded 140 calls last year, are 902-894-8006 or toll-free at 1-800-736-8006. The immediate issue can be shared over the phone and a face-to-face talk with a professional counsellor can be arranged.
