Missouri

Missouri AgrAbility, through its collaborative efforts with the Missouri State Department of Agriculture Farm and Ranch Stress grant initiative, disseminated its behavioral health/mental health tool kit to farm families, agricultural groups, stakeholders, and others. The behavioral health/mental health resources can be accessed on Missouri AgrAbility's "Show-Me Strong Farm Families" Facebook page by clicking here, Missouri AgrAbility's website here, or by downloading the full Mental Health Awareness Month Promotional Toolkit here.

To address the needs of its customers, Missouri AgrAbility continues to build service capacity across the state through education and networking. As such, Missouri AgrAbility and its collaborative partners facilitated the following:

1. Provided four farmstead assessments to client farmers with disabilities who are engaged in farming or want to become involved in a farming-related occupation.
2. Used marketing to direct the public to initiatives in AgrAbility-related education, networking, and assistance.
3. Facilitated three education-based programs within the context of production agriculture:
   • safe selection and placement of assistive technologies,
   • SMART technologies,
   • adapted devices,
   • climate-smart agriculture with the selection, adoption and placement of innovative technologies, and
   • how to use ergonomic principles to teach participants how to work smarter and not harder and,
   • how to avoid secondary injuries for farmers with disabilities.

Submitted by Karen Funkenbusch

Missouri AgrAbility marketing is being incorporated into upcoming Brain Injury Association of Missouri (BIA-MO) one-day regional outdoor camps. The local committees are including marigold planting as an activity at each of the four events for survivors to be aware of Missouri AgrAbility as a resource. These BIA-MO camps are being held in Columbia, Liberty, Springfield, and St. Louis in June 2022.

Submitted by Maureen Cunningham