Life on a farm never slows down. Between employees not showing up, calves being born and mechanical breakdowns, it’s easy to see how something like safety on the farm can be overlooked. That is, until something bad happens.

According to statistics collected by the Agricultural Safety and Health Council of America, it’s not a matter of if something bad will happen on your dairy, but when. Every day, 167 agricultural workers suffer lost work time due to injury. Of those injuries, 5 percent will result in permanent impairment.

Kids are hurt often as well. Each day, 38 children are injured, and only 20 percent of them will be actually working when they get hurt. Even worse – 15 will have a permanent impairment and at least two will die. It’s not a question of why focus on safety, but rather, why aren’t we making it a priority?

I had the opportunity to share some thoughts on safety earlier this year with producers at the Pennsylvania Dairy Summit. Joining me was Walt Moore, a dairy producer from West Grove, Pennsylvania, who showed how a solid and well-known safety culture could come to life on a dairy.

Safety culture is ultimately the way in which safety is managed in the workplace, and it reflects the attitudes, beliefs, perceptions and values that employees share in relation to safety. Our discussion focused on these three key components of a strong safety culture.

Management provides clear leadership

Safety is a culture, not a habit, and an effective safety culture must start with management setting the standard of safety for the dairy. Moore shared that he holds a monthly safety meeting with his entire team to set the tone for “the way we do safety around here.”

During the monthly team meeting, they focus on how they have improved since the last meeting, who had near misses (an accident that was avoided) and what can be learned from them. They finish off the session by discussing a new safety topic. They also have an annual official safety committee training session and one to two surprise farm inspections each year to make sure they’re continuing to build a strong safety culture.

Employees are actively involved

A safety culture is only strong as long as the team embracing it stays dedicated. Employees must have the proper training and believe that what they are doing matters. Our commitment to safety at Cargill starts individually with every employee. Safety is always listed as the first goal for the business, and all employee performance goals start with safety. Moore accomplishes this by rotating the leaders of the safety meetings so that each member has the chance to feel involved.

Everyone takes responsibility for one another

In a strong safety culture, everyone feels responsible for safety and pursues it on a daily basis. Employees go beyond the call of duty to identify unsafe conditions and behaviors and then intervene to correct them. Co-workers routinely look out for one another and point out unsafe behaviors to each other. When someone is doing something wrong on Moore’s dairy, it’s not only acceptable, but expected for another employee to acknowledge the danger in the situation.

A business with a strong safety culture typically experiences few at-risk behaviors, low accident rates, low turnover, low absenteeism and high productivity. But more importantly, it could save someone from a debilitating injury or even death.

I’ll leave you with this thought: Asking me to overlook a simple safety violation is like asking me to revise my opinion of the value of your life. There are a thousand different ways to do it right, but only one way to do it wrong – to not do anything at all. PD

Andy Young
Sales Manager
Cargill Animal Nutrition