FAQs - First Aid on Farms

By Eby M  |   Submitted On September 29, 2015

  

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An image of the rural tranquillity and beauty of farming is a powerfully persuasive one that is commonplace in much of our culture.

However, the reality of 21st century farming in the developed world is usually a thousand miles away from the imaginary utopia of a pseudo-19th century backdrop.

Today's farms are largely production facilities with, for example, significant amounts of farm machinery in use. Almost inevitably where you have human beings and powerful moving machinery in close proximity, accidents happen and that's why the following FAQs on first aid for farmers might be important to you.

Please note that nothing below should be read as qualified first aid medical advice.

What sort of first aid training should people working on farms have?

There are first aid training courses designed with farming personnel specifically in mind.

What they might cover may vary slightly from one course to another but they will all certainly include basics such as how to respond to:

• Coronary and circulatory emergencies, such as heart attacks and strokes etc.
• Electrocution
• Crushing or cutting injuries, including blood loss
• CPR
• Wound dressing
• Choking
• Etc.

How much basic first aid equipment should I have on-site?

That depends very much upon the size and nature of your farm, the first-aid skills you have available and the law.

Certainly no responsible farming business should be without a substantial and good quality first-aid kit sufficient to meet the minimum requirements of the law.

In other situations, it might be advisable to have on-site or easily accessible, things such as defibrillators, blankets and emergency oxygen. A healthcare professional will advise you about this on an approved course.

Should I always attempt first aid in a crisis?

Certainly if someone has suffered a sudden attack of illness or an accident, you should provide whatever assistance is appropriate for the circumstances. In essence, simply talking to reassure someone while waiting for an ambulance could be considered to be a form of first aid - assuming that was all that was required.

First aid training is all about recognizing the nature of the problem and the most appropriate actions to take pending the arrival of expert assistance. That can and does save lives.

Sometimes first aid training is also about teaching people when not to intervene but to wait for a qualified professional instead. For example, trying to get someone who has been injured to drink, whilst waiting for qualified medical assistance, might be ill-advised and possibly dangerous.

In some cases, apart from making the injured party comfortable, it may be more appropriate to do little or nothing and applying unnecessary or inappropriate first aid may actually make the position worse.

That expertise needs to be learned.

Why are there insurance issues involved?

If you have some form of professional agricultural insurance, there will probably be a clause requiring you to comply with all the legal obligations associated with your type of business.

So, for example, if you fail to provide minimum first aid facilities as required under law, you may be putting at risk elements of your professional insurance cover in certain circumstances.

However, this can be a complicated area. It would be sensible to speak to your insurance provider in order to obtain the full details of what they will expect you to provide, as a minimum, in the area of first aid facilities and trained staff, in order to meet the obligations inherent in your policy.

Read more about agriculture machinery and used agriculture machinery from Whites Tractors.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/expert/Eby_M/2140360

From Trash to Savory Mushrooms

By Dan Hakari  |   Submitted On February 19, 2016

  

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Every morning, millions of people wake up with a cup of coffee. Because of our addiction to the black drink of the heavens, about 1.6 billion cups of coffee is drunk everyday around the world. What if we could use those coffee grinds to grow food and reduce landfill waste at the same time? Using such "waste" to grow mushrooms can be the way of sustainable farming and food production.

Being the recyclers of nature, mushrooms can break down plant matter into sugars using lignocellulosic enzymes. This means they can use a wide range of urban wastes like used teas, vegetable and fruit cuttings, dried leaves, sawdust, brewery waste, paper, and much more. In addition, they require less space than other crops; some mushrooms can have twice the yield mass versus compost mass used to grow them. Due to these properties, urban mushroom farms can be setup in relatively ease compared to traditional farms; best of all, many of these by products are given away for free.

Making use of urban wastes to grow mushrooms have always been part of the industry. During the 18th and 19th century, cultivated Agaricus bisporus, or white mushrooms, were grown on horse manure, which was plentiful during the time; plus, there was a need to get rid of them off the urban streets and horse tracks. Today, white mushrooms are grown using cattle and poultry manure mixed with straws.

Of course, there are some precautions when dealing with by-products and food. Most importantly, polluted industrial and agricultural wastes are concerns for mushroom growers using by-products of other industries. Mushrooms are known to accumulate metal ions. By-products tainted with mercury, lead, and cadmium will jeopardize the safety for consumption.

Another issue with some mushroom production is the use of logs as the medium to grow them on. Shiitake mushrooms are usually grown on wood logs as they are naturally decomposers of fallen trees in the wild. As such, 100,000 trees are used yearly. This practice is of course not very sustainable. Using sawdust and straw blocks as a substitution can be used but some claim that the taste is inferior to natural log.

Although many urban centers are starting to improve municipal waste composting facilities to help with the waste management, using the waste to grow mushrooms just sounds a lot more delicious since they are a good source of vitamin B, ascorbic acid, dietary fiber, and bioactive compounds. In fact, you can grow them at home. I would suggest using oyster mushrooms, since they are the easiest to grow, using your own coffee grinds and kitchen waste.

If you like interested in learning more about growing mushrooms using waste, read my more in-depth article on turning trash into savory mushrooms.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/expert/Dan_Hakari/86568

5 Reasons Why Farmers Should Adopt Eco-Friendly Organic Insecticides, Fungicides and Fertilizers

By Rosario Berry  |   Submitted On April 12, 2016

  

Organic agriculture is currently one of the world's fastest growing sectors within the food industry, primarily due to the increasing awareness among consumers about the environment and their own health. Increasing numbers of consumers are shifting towards the organic diet and this has consequently led to an increase in number of farmers who are now switching from the more traditional farming methods to techniques that are far more eco-friendly.

This increasing trend is showing absolutely no signs of slowing down and with further studies in recent years showing just how harmful the chemicals that are used in traditional farming are to both our health and the environment, one can understand why.

This is why the transition to organic farming and the use of products such as an eco-friendly pesticide and an organic fertilizer from leading manufacturers on crops is important for anyone involved in any kind of farming whether it is for industry farming or for home farming.

Take a look at five big reasons you should be considering making the change from the traditional chemical pesticides and fertilizers to the eco-friendly organic insecticides, fungicides and plant nutrient functionality fertilizer:

Ease of transition

One of the biggest benefits of moving over to organic agriculture is that the transition is an easy one. Big changes aren't necessary in farming methods apart from using specially developed products such as eco-friendly pesticides to deal with pests safely and an eco-friendly fertilizer to help the growth of crops in a safe manner.

Decrease in production costs

Another huge benefit is that eco-friendly agriculture is actually cheaper than traditional agriculture. This is because the biological products available from industry leading firms are usually less costly than their chemical filled pesticides and fertilizers. In general, it is believed that around 30% savings can be made on these products.

Healthier soil

The ingredients used in an eco-friendly organic fertilizer or pesticide will help to nourish the soil and its microorganisms while the chemicals and their toxic residues in traditional products will slowly kill the microorganisms and affect the quality and fertility of the soil. This hence could lead to healthier soil that can be sustained for decades.

More money to be made

As is already commonly known, organic products in the stores generally cost more than the standard products. The reason behind this trend is that the current demand for these food products is presently higher than the actual supply and this scarcity allows for higher prices and higher profits for farmers due to the demand. Reliable estimates predict that the demand for organic food products won't be slowing down over the next decade.

Great for our health and the environment

Finally, the main reason as to why you should be making the switch to organic agriculture is because of the health of our planet and our people. The chemicals used in traditional farming products are dangerous to our health and to the environment too. By making the switch and using an eco-friendly organic pesticide and organic fertilizer, you will be doing your part at helping the environment.

Conclusion

As you can see above, there is really no reason to not think about switching over to organic agriculture. It is safer, it is cheaper, it can yield more profits, and it is not even difficult to make the transition. Most importantly, using organic agriculture and products such as an eco-friendly organic insecticides, fungicides and plant nutrient functionality fertilizer will be great for the health of both the environment and the human population.

Rosario Berry is a professional freelance writer, like to introduce Nature and Future. By switching and using an Eco-friendly Organic Insecticidesand organic fertilizer, you will be doing your part at helping the environment.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/expert/Rosario_Berry/1668823

Weed Resistance to Herbicides - What You Can Do

By Eby M  |   Submitted On June 10, 2016

  

A fair bit of a media time around the globe has been devoted recently to the very real and potentially horrific consequences of the growing resistance of many types of harmful bacteria to antibiotics.

That coverage has been justified and it's now widely accepted that if new antibiotics are not quickly found, the world faces a potential return to the health dark ages where relatively minor infections killed people with terrifying regularity.

There is another similar story though, which has not received quite the coverage it perhaps deserves. That is the growing resistance of weeds around the globe to herbicides and what that might mean for agriculture and crop yields in the future.

The Problem

With a population on the planet of over seven billion, the challenge of feeding people has never been higher.

However imperfect food distribution is around the globe and recognising the fact that famines still occur in parts of the world, nevertheless, it is only modern farming methods and agricultural machinery that have allowed us to even partly cope with the challenges of feeding this huge number of human beings.

Whatever we may feel instinctively about the dangers of relying on herbicides to protect our agriculture, today they are an intrinsic part of modern farming and therefore of feeding our population. While there are libraries full of science on the subject, much of it boils down to simply saying that if you have a limited growing capacity, you want to use it for the crops you choose without having them put at risk by competition from sometimes very invasive and destructive weeds.

Although there have been numerous attempts to adopt what might be called green and more natural ways of weed control, herbicides have played and continue to play an important part in this process. Unfortunately, just like bacteria, increasing numbers of extremely harmful weeds are becoming resistant to the current generation of these products.

What You Can Do

There are now major international scientific and collaborative enterprises underway, which are trying to identify new generations of herbicides. At the moment, very little headline news has come out of this process but work continues.

In the meantime, whether you have an ordinary residential garden or even a small plot of land where you grow various crops, there are certain things you can do to potentially help the situation.

1. Consider cutting back on or dropping altogether, your use of industrial herbicides. This is difficult in large-scale farming environments but easier to achieve in smaller situations. The less that existing generation herbicides are used, the longer they will probably remain effective overall or in emergencies.

2. Read up on natural methods of weed control. There are many 'natural' techniques available that do not result in you needing a vast chemicals plant backing you up when trying to keep your weeds down. Those methods will vary depending upon where you are and the weeds involved but there will certainly be green options available on the Internet that do not involve spraying with complex and controversial chemicals.

3. Be prepared to use more manual labour. Our ancestors often kept their growing areas under control simply by pulling weeds as they appeared. Granted, we may have far less time available today that they did but even so, most of us could do far more simply by being prepared to invest a relatively little extra time and effort.

Thinking about shifting yourself away from a dependence on chemical herbicidal products may yield benefits in the medium to long-term both for you and the wider agricultural environment.

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Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/expert/Eby_M/2140360