Project Description:
The Texas AgrAbility Project?s focus is on connecting, assisting, and empowering agricultural producers, their family members, and employees with disabilities and chronic health conditions to stay engaged in production agriculture.
Agriculture work is considered one of the most dangerous occupations in the United States, with an estimated 50,000 disabled farmers and ranchers in Texas. Disabling conditions such as arthritis, amputation, back injuries, heart conditions, traumatic brain injury, and others impact a producer?s ability to perform many of the day-to-day tasks necessary to their operations. These disabilities are often the result of a dangerous work environment where workers often toil in conditions that contribute to or increase the risk of health problems. For example, risks associated with farm equipment operation, handling of livestock, exposure to excessive vibration and motions, potential for increased falls, respiratory hazards, and exposure to extreme temperatures contribute to the overall risk for farmers, ranchers, employees, and family members. There is evidence to suggest that some disabling conditions may increase the risk for secondary injury if preventative steps are not taken. It is estimated that each year, a disabling injury related to work in agriculture occurs on one in every 117 farms. Physical disabilities not related to agriculture increase the rate to one disabling injury for every 24 Texas farms.
Overall Goals and Objectives
The Texas AgrAbility ACE program goal is to connect, assist, and empower agricultural producers, their family members, and employees with disabilities and chronic health conditions to stay engaged in production agriculture. The project does so by:
? Assisting service providers to better understand the unique needs of the agricultural producers as it relates to acquired disabilities and chronic illnesses through training and technical assistance.
? Connecting individuals with a disability to resources specific to their individual needs and to their type of agriculture operation.
? Empowering those who need our services to better navigate the many systems for acquiring disability services and resources, such as assistive etechnology, to help them in their efforts to remain in production agriculture.
Unusual Features
The Texas AgrAbility Project assists individuals to overcome barriers that might otherwise impair their ability to remain in production agriculture by providing:
? Education to individuals with disabilities and their families engaged in production agriculture, as well as service providers who work with them, to increase knowledge about accommodating disabilities, improving function, and avoiding secondary injuries.
? Consultative assistance such as individualized farm and ranch assessment, home environment assessment, financial business analysis, and technical assistance to farmers and ranchers with disabilities and/or chronic illnesses to increase the likelihood that these agriculture producers will remain in production agriculture
? Networking and marketing of the Texas AgrAbility Project to build the capacity to deliver services to the agricultural production employment field through networking and marketing activities with include the dissemination of information, and the identification of AgrAbility clients. Additionally, project staff will forster linkages to disability and health resources.
Expected Benefits
By adopting AgrAbility?s recommendations, persons in the AgrAbility program will increase their ability to:
o Retain/maintain employment in chosen profession
o Manage their farm/ranch
o Complete chores
o Operate machinery
o Gain access to their worksite
Additional expected benefits include:
o General population awareness of employment options for individuals with disabilities in production agriculture
o Disabilities service providers awareness of employment options for individuals with disabilities in production agriculture
o Positive economic impact at the individual, community, and state levels.
__________ FY 2016 ______________
The From battleground to Breaking Ground: A Transformational Journey workshop is a free, agriculture workshop that is designed to educate veterans with or without disabilities, their spouses, beginning farmers/ranchers, small scale producers, and others about agriculture business start-up, business plan development, possibilities for farming/ranching with a disability, financial funding sources for farming/ranching, marketing, and resources to support agriculture business operations. The workshop introduces business ideas and business planning then leads into financial funding programs and resource networking.
To date we have held 18 workshops and have educated more than 500 beginning/farmers ranchers (mostly Veterans) about the possibilities of farming and ranching. Please see our article {here} for more information on Battleground to Breaking Ground.
-----------------------------------
FY 2017
6 additional workshops for the FY 2017.
Provided educational information face to face 130,511 individuals, which equated to 131,709 contact hours. Receive 40 client referrals for Battleground to Breaking Ground. Developed and Distributed over 211 Beginning Farmer manuals. Increase planning small farm group members to 913. Increased social media likes to 371. Developed new newsletter and an online platform. 148 subscribers.
Unserved or Under-served Populations:
Racial or Ethnic Minorities, Disadvantaged Circumstances, Geographic Areas, Rural/Remote, Other
