Media Advocacy for Farm Safety and Health: Current Landscape and Future Directions

News coverage influences what people think (or don’t think) about and journalists can frame how an audience perceives an issue. Few studies have examined the use of media advocacy from an occupational health and safety lens. This study co-authored by staff from PHI’s Berkeley Media Studies Group, aims to:

1. Understand how news coverage portrays tractor safety, and more generally, farm safety
2. Highlight existing gaps in the use of media to promote viable safety solutions; and
3. Identify opportunities for and potential barriers to shifting discussions in the media to benefit farm safety efforts.

This study also includes recommendations for utilizing media advocacy principles to increase support for the implementation of evidence-based solutions in future farm safety and health news.

Methods

LexisNexis and AgInjuryNews were used to collect news media pertaining to farm safety, and specifically tractor safety, published between 2018 and 2021 in Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, and Nebraska. A total of 372 news articles were identified. Content analysis was used to assess a random sample of these articles to answer the questions: (1) why are stories about farm and tractor safety in the news; (2) who speaks in the news about farm and tractor safety; (3) how are farming, farmers, and farm safety depicted in the news; (4) who is named as responsible for and called upon to take action to address farm and tractor safety issues; and (5) what solutions to address farm and tractor safety are mentioned?

Results

In general, relevant news stories were published as a result of event (such as tractor overturns or safety days). Many stories placed responsibility for both farm injury events and the need to increase safety measures solely on farmers, demonstrating a missed opportunity for understanding how farm safety is impacted by the larger societal context, like legislation and government programs.

Conclusions

Using these findings, the authors provide several suggestions for OSH practitioners who hope to improve their use of media to advance farm safety agendas.

Originally published by BMC Public Health