A €1.5 million advertising campaign to reduce the level of deaths on farms, which last year ran at four times the national average for workplace fatalities, was announced yesterday.
Last year 18 people died on Irish farms - the youngest was just four years old - and 3,000 people were injured, making farmyards the most dangerous workplaces in Ireland.
A public awareness campaign was launched yesterday by Minister of State for Labour Affairs Tony Killeen, Minister for Agriculture Mary Coughlan and the acting chief executive of the Health and Safety Authority (HSA), Michael Henry.
The new campaign is to include features such as:
Sponsorship of the TV show Ear to the Ground;
A TV advertising campaign commissioned by the Health and Safety Authority;
National and local newspaper advertising;
A billboard advertising campaign.
The campaign will support the new Agriculture Code of Practice, copies of which have been sent to every farmer in the country. It is designed to encourage farmers to take steps to tackle injury and occupational ill health on farms.
A training programme for farmers is currently being developed and will be rolled out in the coming weeks and months.
Ms Coughlan said the campaign was timely as farm deaths were running at four times the national average for workplace fatalities. The code had been written in a very practical and easy to understand way, she said.
Of the 18 people killed on Irish farms in 2006, ten were aged 65 or over. Figures published by the HSA last week showed that the second most dangerous sector in which to work last year was construction, which saw 12 fatalities.