Changing our attitude and behaviour towards farm safety takes time. We should take every opportunity to remind ourselves and those around us, our loved ones, farm staff and the broader industry that we need to give farm safety time.

The Tullamore Show, taking place this Sunday 13 August, offers us that opportunity to remind ourselves and our families of where we can avoid risk.

But first, as a brief reminder that farming continues to be Ireland’s most dangerous occupation, consider some of these statistics that we all need to avoid becoming part of.

Excluding this year, 197 lives have been lost within the agricultural community since 2007. These fatalities were primarily as a result of tractors and farm vehicles, machinery and livestock.

To break these stats down further in the same period, 54 of these deaths were due to tractors and farm vehicles.

Machinery accounted for a further 41 fatalities. Livestock was responsible for 26 deaths.

A total of 23 children have lost their lives, while there have been 66 older farmer fatalities. There have been 14 lives lost to date in 2017.

Safe Family Farms, brought to you by the Irish Farmers Journal and ESB Networks, will display its model farm at the Irish Farmers Journal stand to raise awareness for young and old of the risks around your farm yard.

FRS Training, in conjunction with the Health and Safety Authority (HSA) and FBD, will run Farm Safety Live.

This live demonstration will bring to life the risks around working with livestock, PTOs and the very relevant safe bale handling.