Warm welcome awaits at Rural Support stand

WITH Balmoral Show only days away, Rural Support is excited to be welcoming everyone back to its stand at the 2022 show along with the Farm Families Health Check team. This is a significant year for Rural Support as it celebrates its 20th anniversary of supporting farming families in Northern Ireland.

Throughout the four-day event Rural Support will be showcasing the services and programmes it offers and on Friday, May 13, it will officially launch its ‘Reviving Rural’ project, which has received funding from the Department of Health via the Community Foundation for Northern Ireland. This launch will take place at its stand, C7, on Friday at 11am.

The Reviving Rural project will support farmers and farming family members to improve their mental wellbeing and develop new skills and knowledge, given this is a vital part of running a successful and sustainable farm enterprise.

The project comes at a crucial time for farmers and farming families across Northern Ireland. Rural Support will provide one-to-one counselling and trauma therapy support for 100 farming families across Northern Ireland. The project will also provide new downloadable information, videos and a series of related training webinars through the health and wellbeing section of the Northern Ireland Farm Support Hub.

The project also focuses on helping women and young people in agriculture to develop emotional toolkits to deal with pressures and help develop positive mental health practices in the farming home. The organisation aims to help reduce the stigma associated with mental health by directly focusing on providing sensitive and specifically tailored information that speaks to the specific needs of the farming community.

CEO Veronica Morris said: “We are very excited to be bringing this unique mental health project to the agricultural sector over the next two years. Through Reviving Rural the organisation continues to take practical steps to support farmers and farming families in building resilience and there is no better place to launch this vital project than Northern Ireland’s largest agricultural show.”

This year’s show runs from Wednesday, May 11, to Saturday, May 14. Rural Support is encouraging anyone attending to call at its stand to find out more about the services and programmes on offer.