September 23, 2024 • 8 mins
It's Mental Health Awareness Week - Supported by Federated Farmers – backing Kiwi farmers when times are tough! Today it's the turn of Federated Farmers' Meat and Wool Chair to share some sage advice.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Federated Farmers bringing us Mental Health Awareness Week here on
the country. Toby, how's your mental health at the moment?
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Good afternoon, Good afternoon doing My mental health is actually
really good. I took two days off last week and
faded in the poverty. They open golf tournament, so I'm
feeling I'm feeling pretty well relaxed.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Actually, mind you, golf can have really negative effects on
mental health. I've found over the years. Maybe you're a
better player than me.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
No, I don't think I'm a better player than you.
But I buried a few demons. I managed to win
my division, buried a few demons from losing finals over
the last few years, and came out of it thinking,
you know what, life is actually pretty good.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Good.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
You left me start through the docking and thought, you
know what, the metal health is really important. So that
was me ticking that box.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
Well, not everyone has the has is fortunate enough to
have staff, a lot of one and one man and
one woman bands out there. It's carving and lambing for
your industry, obviously lambing, although you're throw it in the
North Island. Very difficult to get our farm at this
time of the year, but it's so important to get
off farm.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
Yeah, it really is, and it could be something little
like my wife and I as you decided, you know,
the kid a little bit older, you know, to spend
it more time together. We're going to sten date nights.
So it's just getting off and going out for dinner.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
Was that good for her mental health?
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Well, yeah it was. She never grubby farmer sitting at
home the whole time. But it worked really well. It
just meant it was a little thing, but it meant
we weren't talking about barber. We speak of quality time
together and it just gave you a little week break
even though you were still, you know, within the key
of your farm. It just made a big difference to
coming back and you know, feeding like you've a bit
of a weight lifted off you.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
Later in the week, we're going to be Chase chatting.
Should I say to Jason Herrick, who's your Southland president
of Federated Farmers. And this is a guy who's been
very open about his problems. He tried to commit suicide
I think in twenty eighteen. He's got an inspirational story.
You'll hear that later in the week. But his mental health,
along with all the farmers at the bottom end of
(01:56):
the country. Toby has been really affected by the weather.
I mean, without stating the obvious, what advice do you
give those people, because sometimes that just doesn't seem to
be an end inside.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
No, they doesn't. And we've been through this, you know
obviously the last three years cut after from my area.
It's you know, you just got to keep putting you
bootsbeck on, you know, and then the sun does come
back again. It's really difficult. And I think the big
thing is ignore the media, ignore social media, get off
that stuff, because you know it's pretty negative. As you know,
there's some green groups out there that are just chasing
the shed out of farmers and having some sating that
(02:31):
something sational headlines that just really farmers don't need to
know about. They're doing the best, you know, Mother nature
can be a bit some days, and you know, it's
just really tough and we really feel for those guys
down there. We were talking earlier. It's been probably a
good decade since we've had something similar to the stepping
down there, so they've had a good run of it.
But man, yeah, it was pretty tough down there for
(02:52):
those guys.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
Yeah, and you go halfway between you and me, or
nearly halfway, and you get to the likes of North
Canterbury where they're facing and so wise it's more of
an insidious problem, and that is drought. At least after
wet weather in the spring or a storm at landing
and carving time, the sun does come out, you've got
plenty of moisture. You can grow some grass. That may
(03:13):
not be an opportunity afforded to those farmers.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
No it's not. And I was actually just down in
North Canterbury. I did a tour down there towards the
beginning of the month and they had the North Canterburry
Drought Function up up way Kerry, and so I went
down there and caught up with the farmers just have
a chance to see how they are doing mentally, and
I was blowing away, actually how good these guys were.
They've got great plans in place, you know, they've done
that key thing and they's putting some lines in the
(03:38):
sand and saying, right when I get to hear, I'm
going to this is what I'm going to do. And
they're all focused on next year. I mean I think
a lot of them go like this year is going
to be tough, a tough sheep year again. But how
do we protect our product production? How do we look
at the future and go right? Next year is going
to be a much better year. It's make some good
decisions early now and protect our us and move forward.
(03:59):
So I thought the North Kenaby guys, for they've been
through in the last twelve months, we're actually doing really well.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
I reckon, you've got to be pretty tough to farm
in that environment. Anyhow, Look, Kiwi blokes right across the board,
not only farmers, this is Kiwi blokes right across the board.
Aren't that good at opening up and sharing problems? No,
no one there as good as the women are. But
then we've got people like John Kerwin, your president Wayne
Langford hopefully we're chatting to him this week as well,
(04:26):
who have led the way on mental health. And I
know it's a cliche, but it's okay not to be okay.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
Yeah, definitely is. And one of those comments was actually
made down in North Canlibury is that some of the
farmers that really should have been there work there. But
the farmers around him noticed that, and they're going to
go and have a chat with these guys privately, you know,
just to make sure that they're still ticking you along.
They've got those lines of communication open. There's no stigmatism anymore.
You know, everybody's going to have your down days. It's
a matter of how do you make sure you know,
(04:56):
you don't make the silly decisions around there. Make sure
you're talking to your partner. It's a big thing. You
talk with your wife, you know, if you can get
off farm, like I said, don't have a you know,
have a night out with their leave the kids at
home or out the neighbors, look after your kids and
just take their little wee step, just to take yourself
off and forget about the farm for a minute. It's
it's really key to you know, feeding be here about yourself.
(05:17):
Just been open to talking. You know, you've got you've
got a partner, Utilize them. You know they're they're you
know you've married them for a reason.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
Yeah, well I guess you have, especially if she came
with the farm Mateoby, I'm not saying that you did that. Yeah,
it just helps. It just helps looked on a more
serious pain and I saw it, and I apologize for
being a bit flippant about that, and let them. There's
no sugarcoating this. The suicide rates for rural New Zealand
are awful. They're appalling one point five times more likely
(05:47):
to commit suicide if you're living in rural New Zealand
rather than urban New Zealand. I know we've got all
these organizations, Rural Support Trust, Farmstrong doing really great work,
but we're not saying a drop on those rates.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
No. I think that comes down to our isolation. You know,
we're becoming more and more isolators of the real community
and the feeling, the perceived feeling, is that you know
that the town's against us, and then you throw in
some high interest rates that you've got no control over,
you throw in some adverse weather conditions, and it just
start to mount up on people, especially smaller farms where
you're a one man band, you know, where you know,
(06:26):
maybe you're still supporting mum and dad. Then and you
feel like you've got the waight of the world on you.
It's it's really tough. There's no easy way out, but
you be able to put your hand up and talk
to somebody, talk to your part, and they talk to
your neighbor and if you if you've got a neighbor
that you haven't heard from for a little while, go
knock on your door, take a six pack of beers
around and just sit down with them and say, hey, man,
you're feeling okay. You know, we've got to be more
(06:47):
open and more honest about our feelings as rural men.
And you know, from Confederator Farmer's perspective, we know we
need to keep pushing harder to make sure that you know,
we're getting the government's getting the rules and regulations right,
so we're we're not got this isolation that keeps pouring
down on us, whether it's the land use change or
access to education for our kids and then be able
(07:10):
to get staff onto your fund. Those are big things
that we've got to focus on try to ease that
mutal boot.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
All right. So we've got a really interesting text in
yesterday and I'm going to repeat it. And the text
has said it would be interesting to see the correlation
between rural and mental health and the demise of the
country pub. And I don't want to glorified drinking because
it might not be the pub. It might be the
church or the rugby club that's spins your wheels or whatever.
But there's no doubt about it, getting in and networking,
(07:36):
whether it's Friday night at the pub or Sunday morning
at church. I was going to say, I know which
one I'd prefer, but I was raised a Catholic and
I may be struck down for saying that. But whatever
your whatever your choice is, it's so important to do that.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
It is. And that's one of the things I found
eatually down a Candyfrey more so than my home home patches.
There are all these little townships around you know, you're
not very far from one, and he's got great communities
around you, which I think is why we're seeing him
so resilient. There's a little bit less isolation in them.
But your local pub, your local churches, squash club, you know,
your rugby club, you're all key components to being even
(08:13):
if you're not you know, just just seeing someone else
who's not who's not on your farm, you know you're
off farm. It's about removing yourself from the you know,
from the fence. You need to be repearing and you
can't quite it around to what you know, the views
landing just for a few hours, it gives you that break.
Check the rugby on or check the cricket on on
my sky down at the end and join a few
mates for a quiet, beautiful, it's perfect.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
Good on your mental Health Awareness Week. There with Toby
Williams from Federated Farmers, The Sheep and Wool Chair Mental
Health Awareness Week, Bye from Federated Farmers. Back in Kiwi's
when times are tough
Federated Farmers bringing us Mental Health Awareness Week here on
the country. Toby, how's your mental health at the moment?
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Good afternoon, Good afternoon doing My mental health is actually
really good. I took two days off last week and
faded in the poverty. They open golf tournament, so I'm
feeling I'm feeling pretty well relaxed.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Actually, mind you, golf can have really negative effects on
mental health. I've found over the years. Maybe you're a
better player than me.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
No, I don't think I'm a better player than you.
But I buried a few demons. I managed to win
my division, buried a few demons from losing finals over
the last few years, and came out of it thinking,
you know what, life is actually pretty good.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Good.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
You left me start through the docking and thought, you
know what, the metal health is really important. So that
was me ticking that box.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
Well, not everyone has the has is fortunate enough to
have staff, a lot of one and one man and
one woman bands out there. It's carving and lambing for
your industry, obviously lambing, although you're throw it in the
North Island. Very difficult to get our farm at this
time of the year, but it's so important to get
off farm.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
Yeah, it really is, and it could be something little
like my wife and I as you decided, you know,
the kid a little bit older, you know, to spend
it more time together. We're going to sten date nights.
So it's just getting off and going out for dinner.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
Was that good for her mental health?
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Well, yeah it was. She never grubby farmer sitting at
home the whole time. But it worked really well. It
just meant it was a little thing, but it meant
we weren't talking about barber. We speak of quality time
together and it just gave you a little week break
even though you were still, you know, within the key
of your farm. It just made a big difference to
coming back and you know, feeding like you've a bit
of a weight lifted off you.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
Later in the week, we're going to be Chase chatting.
Should I say to Jason Herrick, who's your Southland president
of Federated Farmers. And this is a guy who's been
very open about his problems. He tried to commit suicide
I think in twenty eighteen. He's got an inspirational story.
You'll hear that later in the week. But his mental health,
along with all the farmers at the bottom end of
(01:56):
the country. Toby has been really affected by the weather.
I mean, without stating the obvious, what advice do you
give those people, because sometimes that just doesn't seem to
be an end inside.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
No, they doesn't. And we've been through this, you know
obviously the last three years cut after from my area.
It's you know, you just got to keep putting you
bootsbeck on, you know, and then the sun does come
back again. It's really difficult. And I think the big
thing is ignore the media, ignore social media, get off
that stuff, because you know it's pretty negative. As you know,
there's some green groups out there that are just chasing
the shed out of farmers and having some sating that
(02:31):
something sational headlines that just really farmers don't need to
know about. They're doing the best, you know, Mother nature
can be a bit some days, and you know, it's
just really tough and we really feel for those guys
down there. We were talking earlier. It's been probably a
good decade since we've had something similar to the stepping
down there, so they've had a good run of it.
But man, yeah, it was pretty tough down there for
(02:52):
those guys.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
Yeah, and you go halfway between you and me, or
nearly halfway, and you get to the likes of North
Canterbury where they're facing and so wise it's more of
an insidious problem, and that is drought. At least after
wet weather in the spring or a storm at landing
and carving time, the sun does come out, you've got
plenty of moisture. You can grow some grass. That may
(03:13):
not be an opportunity afforded to those farmers.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
No it's not. And I was actually just down in
North Canterbury. I did a tour down there towards the
beginning of the month and they had the North Canterburry
Drought Function up up way Kerry, and so I went
down there and caught up with the farmers just have
a chance to see how they are doing mentally, and
I was blowing away, actually how good these guys were.
They've got great plans in place, you know, they've done
that key thing and they's putting some lines in the
(03:38):
sand and saying, right when I get to hear, I'm
going to this is what I'm going to do. And
they're all focused on next year. I mean I think
a lot of them go like this year is going
to be tough, a tough sheep year again. But how
do we protect our product production? How do we look
at the future and go right? Next year is going
to be a much better year. It's make some good
decisions early now and protect our us and move forward.
(03:59):
So I thought the North Kenaby guys, for they've been
through in the last twelve months, we're actually doing really well.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
I reckon, you've got to be pretty tough to farm
in that environment. Anyhow, Look, Kiwi blokes right across the board,
not only farmers, this is Kiwi blokes right across the board.
Aren't that good at opening up and sharing problems? No,
no one there as good as the women are. But
then we've got people like John Kerwin, your president Wayne
Langford hopefully we're chatting to him this week as well,
(04:26):
who have led the way on mental health. And I
know it's a cliche, but it's okay not to be okay.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
Yeah, definitely is. And one of those comments was actually
made down in North Canlibury is that some of the
farmers that really should have been there work there. But
the farmers around him noticed that, and they're going to
go and have a chat with these guys privately, you know,
just to make sure that they're still ticking you along.
They've got those lines of communication open. There's no stigmatism anymore.
You know, everybody's going to have your down days. It's
a matter of how do you make sure you know,
(04:56):
you don't make the silly decisions around there. Make sure
you're talking to your partner. It's a big thing. You
talk with your wife, you know, if you can get
off farm, like I said, don't have a you know,
have a night out with their leave the kids at
home or out the neighbors, look after your kids and
just take their little wee step, just to take yourself
off and forget about the farm for a minute. It's
it's really key to you know, feeding be here about yourself.
(05:17):
Just been open to talking. You know, you've got you've
got a partner, Utilize them. You know they're they're you
know you've married them for a reason.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
Yeah, well I guess you have, especially if she came
with the farm Mateoby, I'm not saying that you did that. Yeah,
it just helps. It just helps looked on a more
serious pain and I saw it, and I apologize for
being a bit flippant about that, and let them. There's
no sugarcoating this. The suicide rates for rural New Zealand
are awful. They're appalling one point five times more likely
(05:47):
to commit suicide if you're living in rural New Zealand
rather than urban New Zealand. I know we've got all
these organizations, Rural Support Trust, Farmstrong doing really great work,
but we're not saying a drop on those rates.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
No. I think that comes down to our isolation. You know,
we're becoming more and more isolators of the real community
and the feeling, the perceived feeling, is that you know
that the town's against us, and then you throw in
some high interest rates that you've got no control over,
you throw in some adverse weather conditions, and it just
start to mount up on people, especially smaller farms where
you're a one man band, you know, where you know,
(06:26):
maybe you're still supporting mum and dad. Then and you
feel like you've got the waight of the world on you.
It's it's really tough. There's no easy way out, but
you be able to put your hand up and talk
to somebody, talk to your part, and they talk to
your neighbor and if you if you've got a neighbor
that you haven't heard from for a little while, go
knock on your door, take a six pack of beers
around and just sit down with them and say, hey, man,
you're feeling okay. You know, we've got to be more
(06:47):
open and more honest about our feelings as rural men.
And you know, from Confederator Farmer's perspective, we know we
need to keep pushing harder to make sure that you know,
we're getting the government's getting the rules and regulations right,
so we're we're not got this isolation that keeps pouring
down on us, whether it's the land use change or
access to education for our kids and then be able
(07:10):
to get staff onto your fund. Those are big things
that we've got to focus on try to ease that
mutal boot.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
All right. So we've got a really interesting text in
yesterday and I'm going to repeat it. And the text
has said it would be interesting to see the correlation
between rural and mental health and the demise of the
country pub. And I don't want to glorified drinking because
it might not be the pub. It might be the
church or the rugby club that's spins your wheels or whatever.
But there's no doubt about it, getting in and networking,
(07:36):
whether it's Friday night at the pub or Sunday morning
at church. I was going to say, I know which
one I'd prefer, but I was raised a Catholic and
I may be struck down for saying that. But whatever
your whatever your choice is, it's so important to do that.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
It is. And that's one of the things I found
eatually down a Candyfrey more so than my home home patches.
There are all these little townships around you know, you're
not very far from one, and he's got great communities
around you, which I think is why we're seeing him
so resilient. There's a little bit less isolation in them.
But your local pub, your local churches, squash club, you know,
your rugby club, you're all key components to being even
(08:13):
if you're not you know, just just seeing someone else
who's not who's not on your farm, you know you're
off farm. It's about removing yourself from the you know,
from the fence. You need to be repearing and you
can't quite it around to what you know, the views
landing just for a few hours, it gives you that break.
Check the rugby on or check the cricket on on
my sky down at the end and join a few
mates for a quiet, beautiful, it's perfect.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
Good on your mental Health Awareness Week. There with Toby
Williams from Federated Farmers, The Sheep and Wool Chair Mental
Health Awareness Week, Bye from Federated Farmers. Back in Kiwi's
when times are tough
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