Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Speaker A: Hey, folks, welcome to the what the Futures podcast, your quick guide to better farming decisions.
Alrighty, folks, I've got Deb Van Berkel with the Canadian center for Agricultural well Being joining me on this week's episode. Deb, how's your morning going?
[00:00:24] Speaker B: It's going great. How's your morning going?
[00:00:28] Speaker A: Fantastic. I have been. Winter arrives sometime in the next couple days, so I've been.
I need to put up my Christmas lights.
I usually like to have a little bit of ice and risk involved, but I'm going to do my first outdoor hockey rink. So I've been researching do I put the free grain bag out there and put water on top of that or and make ice or do I spend four grand on little plastic boards with plastic and make ice? I'm trying to weigh that out.
[00:00:57] Speaker B: Yeah, that's a big decision.
[00:00:58] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. So I'll let you know how it turns out because I'm going to see you in just over a month in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan. You're joining us at the Crop Marketing Made Cool conference. And I'm excited that you're making the journey.
[00:01:12] Speaker B: I am looking very much forward to it. I've met some wonderful people this past couple of months from Saskatchewan, and I am just very excited to join you.
[00:01:22] Speaker A: Awesome. So we're talking, you know, crop marketing for the most part while we're there, but also wanted to bring in a few different elements. We've got a few different financial folks joining us, but, you know, the, the one thing that continues to just be top of mind for me, especially in the current farm economic conditions, is, is the, the stress level and the. An.
You know, you're a farmer as well, and I, I just, I'm excited to, to have you join us and I'm just curious if you could give us a little sneak peek on your topic.
[00:02:03] Speaker B: Sure, absolutely.
So talking about mental health is such a broad topic and I love that you're talking about costs because if we think about that in terms of mental health, we can talk about the cost of stress.
It's really something that nobody talks about. It's kind of that hidden piece in the ledger. Right. Something that people don't really put down, they don't actually have throughout their input or output costs. They don't put in cost distress. And so finding out what that actually means for a lot of people and putting it into terms that they understand is always my focus because we experience mental health every day. It's a part of everybody's life. If they say they don't experience it, they're lying. They do. Especially with stress. It's just learning what stress really is and how it impacts the actual person because it impacts everybody differently. And it looks different on everybody's ledger, really.
So it's just learning that particular piece when we talk about the cost of stress.
[00:03:11] Speaker A: So when we look at the cost of stress, are you thinking kind of like in the, like the decision, like some of the, well, you know, tens, hundreds, thousands of decisions that need to be made any given day, week, month on the farm, Is that what you're drilling down into?
[00:03:29] Speaker B: A little bit, yes. If we think about it this way. Let me, let me say it like this.
[00:03:34] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:03:35] Speaker B: If stress was, were attacks, farmers would have paid off the country's debt just in Canada because of the cost. So we look at what stress causes a person.
Time, energy, relationships. Right. All of these pieces. But we don't take account for that because it's not in the forefront of our minds. We just do, we just go. Right. We're dairy farmers here. So that's really one of the things that kind of led me into working with people because I see it firsthand all the time. Right. What it looks like, especially with weather. We've had rain now for which, I don't know, like a week, which is amazing because we just went through the dry summer in like 50 years and we're still trying to get crops off. So I can appreciate all the different types of stress that come into it.
[00:04:28] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:04:29] Speaker B: So it's really helping people understand what that tax on themselves really is.
[00:04:35] Speaker A: Yep. No, that, that's great. I'm, I, I'm excited to see that presentation. And I know even for myself, like in a very small scale, you know, planning this conference. Right, Planning this conference and the decisions that go with it. And I've just found myself here the last couple days where I'm, I'm just struggling to make small decisions or I'm not putting any thought into as much thought, where I'm just like, yeah, that's fine, that's fine. Like, I don't want to deal with it. That's fine. You know, let's just get it over with. Some of this stuff. So I can't imagine on a farm, I know we had a couple of major breakdowns this fall. We're talking six figure repair bills and the decisions that had to be made around that, you know, that big financial, I don't want to say necessarily cost, but a big financial implication for sure. So. All right, Deb, so what, what led you to the Canadian center for Agricultural well Being, the ccaw. Like, when did you start? Like, what do you, what do you do within the organization? What led you there?
[00:05:36] Speaker B: Well, I've worked in mental health for a very, very, very long time. And I got into working with farmers when I decided to work on independent practice. So when I became a therapist and wanted to see clients, it really kind of led me down that path. And so I, I started focusing on creating a program that was specific to farmers. So here in this particular area, it's called the Farmer Wellness Program. And then it got picked up and then I met Brianna and I met Marnie and I met all the wonderful people that work for ccaw.
And CCAW was formed because we were all very like minded people who all had the goal of helping farmers and really focusing on getting the services, the programs, the resources to every farmer across Canada.
They deserve it. And we know what the stressors are that come with being a farmer. They can't get to appointments like other people can get to appointments. You know, things come up. There's always different things that are happening. And there were no services, resources, programming that were tailored to farmers.
And we wanted to make sure that we could do something like that. And so everything that we do is for farmers and it's built by farmers. So when we create programs, when we create resources, whatever services, we always make sure that we have focus groups and target farmers for them to say, yes, this will work.
[00:07:07] Speaker A: Yeah, awesome. Well, we appreciate your efforts and what you guys are doing at the CCAW and keep up the good work. I, you know, I was driving down, it felt like a country song to some degree. I was listening to the country radio station, but I'm driving down a dirt road in September at the farm and you guys had a, a radio ad come on, a radio awareness campaign. And actually I was just listening to it. I was like, hey, that's a ccaw. And I thought it was really neat and well done. So keep it up, keep up the good work and look forward to seeing, seeing, seeing you and Moose Jaw and seeing what you guys come up with here, your organization. So I just wanted to shed some light on a little thing we have going on here in the background. So even before Moose Jaw, we have an auction that kicked off November 7th. So if you're listening to this podcast after November 7th, don't worry, you can still get in on the auction. But the funds that we raise are all going towards the CCAW and to help support the farmer crisis line, the mental health line and other projects that you have going on. I should have been wearing my hat. It's right on the shelf behind me. We had done that summer project there, but this is the next. The next version. So just quickly folks, if you go to Ryandenee Ca, you'll find the link here. Again, all the money raised is going to the ccaw and we have things like a ticket for the Crop Marketing Made Cool conference.
[00:08:39] Speaker B: Right?
[00:08:39] Speaker A: Those are hard to come by. We have a ticket for that. We have Trent Klarenbach. We have a one year subscription that you can bid on. We have left field commodity subscriptions. We have Trigger Grain marketing subscription with them as well. We've got WestJet travel gift card from Pro Grow. We've got what the Futures gear, Cabela's gift card, hockey tickets, a crib board. A lot of fun stuff there, folks. So please go and check that out. All right, Deb, anything else you want to add before I let you go? I appreciate the time this week.
[00:09:10] Speaker B: I am truly excited to see everybody in person and really be a part of this fantastic conference. I am thrilled that you thought of us and I really appreciate you including us to be a part of this. So thank you so much.
[00:09:25] Speaker A: No pressure. No pressure. You are the anchor of the event, so no pressure at all. But look forward to it.
[00:09:31] Speaker B: Farmers aren't used to pressure, so I can appreciate that. That's.
[00:09:34] Speaker A: Thanks. There you go. Thanks, Deb. Have a great rest of your week.
[00:09:37] Speaker B: You too. Thank you.
