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In this article, ADAS senior consultant John Newton highlights the risks faced and reminds water companies that as employers, they have responsibilities to their staff and contractors for Health & Safety.

Water company infrastructure projects often require a range of personnel from both contractors and the utility to access land used by the agricultural industry. In doing so, in addition to the more obvious dangers workers face, there are two areas often overlooked by workers engaged in pipeline construction or rehabilitation: biosecurity and aggressive livestock. In this article, ADAS senior consultant John Newton highlights the risks faced and reminds water companies that as employers, they have responsibilities to their staff and contractors for Health & Safety.

Do you know what you may be bringing onto farms?

UK intensive livestock (pigs and poultry) production has a proud and hard won reputation for having some of the highest animal health and welfare standards in the world. High animal health standards come from implementing strict biosecurity standards on farms. Biosecurity can be defined as “the actions taken to both reduce the risk of infection entering the farm and to remove infection from the farm.” Breaches in biosecurity can lead, for example, to poultry flocks contracting diseases such as Avian Influenza (“bird flu”) which can decimate the flock or require the flock to be compulsorily slaughtered.

Contractors that come onto intensive livestock farms as a result of an emergency (such as maintenance engineers) pose a particularly high risk as they may have come directly from another unit and often carry tools (which can be contaminated with pathogen carrying dust, litter etc) from site to site. In such circumstances, the farm’s biosecurity procedures may become breached leading to a possible disease outbreak. To find out what you can do to minimise the risk of this happening, contact the ADAS Sustainable Livestock team.

Are farm fields safe places to work?

Often contractors are required to undertake work in farmers’ fields where livestock may be present. But are they safe places to work?

We are all aware of the potential risks to human safety if we enter fields where bulls may be present. But, did you know that e...