COMMENTARY: Farmers support grain safety training and equipment

Crispin Colvin is the Director of the Ontario Federation of Agriculture: 

Safety is important in farming, and many organizations work hard to raise awareness of being safe around farm machinery or when working with livestock. The topic of safety around harvested grain can be overlooked – but with grain harvest now underway in Ontario, it’s also an important one to know about.

In many areas of the province, you’ll see the golden fields of ripe wheat or barley become grain kernels and straw as farmers work on their fields. Harvested grain is hauled away from the field in wagons or tractor trailers, and stored in grain bins on the farm, delivered directly to a local grain elevator or sometimes even taken straight to a port for export.

Regardless of how it is handled and stored, however, it’s important to keep safety top of mind. Trailers and bins of grain can be dangerous when you’re working with them and it’s easy to become trapped inside – an experience often described like quicksand. If help doesn’t come in time, it can lead to suffocation.

That’s why the Ontario Federation of Agriculture (OFA), where I serve as part of the provincial board of directors, is supporting a variety of projects around the province that focus on safety awareness as well as training for first responders who will be the ones called to the rescue – literally – in case of an emergency.

Through these projects, local and regional federations of agriculture are helping to fund grain extraction units and equipment for rural fire departments as well as training on how to use these tools. The goal is to ensure that an emergency call involving someone trapped in a grain bin or trailer will be a successful rescue instead of a recovery mission.

These projects are part of OFA’s Revive Fund, which was launched in 2021 to help communities struggling impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Through the fund, our 51 county and regional federations can apply for matching funding from OFA to help plan, develop and launch new projects and initiatives in support of agriculture and their local communities.

So far, about $975,000 has been invested into the program by the OFA, its county and regional federations and other partners since its inception, and new project ideas come forward every year.

They are a great way to strengthen connections between OFA members and their communities in helping to raise awareness and support for the agriculture sector – and the grain extraction training and equipment is a terrific example of how farmers are actively engaged in meeting the needs of their local communities.

Many other local and regional federations of agriculture are also using support from the Revive Fund to provide First Aid and CPR training for their members and families.

Many rural fire departments, who are responsible for first response, are staffed by volunteers, so help can take longer to arrive than in urban regions – and farms are usually not close to populated areas. That’s why knowing what to do in an emergency is critical and can mean the difference between life and death.

Most farms are small family businesses who don’t have the health and safety training opportunities and workplace safety committees commonly found with larger companies or employers in other sectors, so OFA helps fill that gap.

As an organization, we take all aspects of farm safety seriously and we work with many other like-minded groups to promote awareness and ensure people have the tools they need to stay safe. After all, accidents can be minimized or even prevented with knowledge and training.