Award for emerging researcher exploring work relationships and safety on New Zealand dairy farms
Deborah Rhodes, a PhD student at Te Kura Tātai Hauora—The School of Health, has received the 2024 Emerging Researcher Award at the National Rural Health Conference.
Deborah’s PhD looks specifically at dairy farm assistants, their relational transactions on the farm, and if there are consequences from those interactions on safety behaviour.
Deborah says that receiving the award validated that this research is important and needs to be done.
“The dairy farm assistant is often the youngest person on the farm, they have the least experience, and their tasks are predominantly isolated in the dairy milking shed where they experience most harm from interacting not just with large animals, but chemicals, hot water, machinery, and heavy weights.”
She says that understanding this group of workers is important with approximately 35,000 workers harvesting the raw milk product for the valued export contribution of nearly $22 billion.
“For every 100 new workers in the dairy industry, half will have left in the first year, so we need to understand what is happening to them.”
Deborah says that receiving congratulations on the award feels unusual as her research is for a cause, not a competition.
“It’s also a health issue that I am looking at, not a machinery issue, not an engineering issue, but a healthy at work issue. Recognition that this research is tackling a rural health issue is great.”
Professor Joanne Crawford, Deborah’s supervisor, says that her research is making a valuable contribution and part of building health and safety capability for both practitioners and researchers.
“We all work to make New Zealand a healthier and safer place.”
The National Rural Health Conference is organized annually by Hauora Taiwhenua Rural Health Network, who shared that Deborah’s work addresses critical gaps, using innovative methodologies to shed light on rural health challenges, aiming for tangible policy improvements and community resilience.