Mental health referrals among Southland farmers double in past year

The number of mental health cases among farmers in the Southland region doubled at the end of 2023 as compared to the previous year.

New figures show a mixture of financial pressures, employment issues, and isolation, all adding to the stresses involved in the country's biggest export earner.

Southland dairy farmer Jason Herrick told 1News he loved his job but the stresses involved ultimately led to his breakdown in 2018.

"That was on the back of a really bad weather year, but many, many years of not dealing with my own personal problems and demons within the industry, and it took me a wee while to get over that," he told 1News.

Between August and November last year, the Rural Support Trust received 31 new mental health cases.

Rural Support Trust Southland wellness coordinator Rachael Nicholson said tragically many of the calls they received from farmers were from "at the bottom of the cliff".

"It keeps growing from year to year… we had one coordinator in our province who looked after everything; we now have two coordinators."

These updated numbers reflect a message Federated Farmers have been pushing for whilst farmers are constantly facing new challenges.

President Wayne Langford said: "Farmers are really starting to feel that pressure and fatigue. Adding on to that the lowering of product prices, interest rates, and some of the regulations coming down the pipeline at them - farmers are feeling overwhelmed."

Looming climate issues are also playing a part for farmers in the region.

Herrick said: "Staffing issues are huge down here because people don't want to come and live down here in Southland because of the extreme weather conditions."

Statistics from Rural Support Trust show that of all those new cases, the highest number was from the Southern region, at nearly 40%.

Broken down by sector, dairy is at the top of the charts at 36%, followed by sheep at 18%, then sheep and beef at 15%.

When looking at the cases by gender, cases from male farmers made up 69.7%.

Just under half of the new cases, at 44%, were people aged between 21 to 35 years, whilst 36 to 50-year-olds accounted for 28%.

The Federated Farmers president added: "All the surveys that we've done, whether that be the RaboBank or Federated Farmers farmer confidence survey, are all saying the same thing, which is a downward trend in farmer confidence."

It's a reality that's now also facing future generations.

"None of my kids want to follow in my footsteps; none of them want to stay in the rural sector and go farming,” Herrick said.

“They've seen what their father has gone through over the years, and they don't want a part of it, and that's really unfortunate."

He continued: "It's a call out to all the politicians right? Because those are the guys that make all the regulations that put a lot of the pressures on."