The psychological impact of the Foot and Mouth Disease crisis on Dutch dairy farmers

Authors

  • E.H. Van Haaften
  • M. Olff
  • P.H. Kersten

Keywords:

stress, marginalization, depression, The Netherlands, dairy farmers

Abstract

Farmers in general have to deal with many changes upon which traditional behaviour or knowledge has no answer. One situation is the European policy to combat epidemic livestock diseases like the Swine Fever (1998) and Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) (2001) in Netherlands. The psychological impact of the FMD-policy has hardly been investigated. In this study, this impact was studied among dairy farmers by comparing areas with different severity of the crisis. 661 Dutch dairy farmers from one cultural group were surveyed. Questionnaires about stress, psychological marginalization and depression were administered in three different areas: the culled area, buffer area and FMD-free area. The psychological impact of the FMD-crisis was associated with differences in levels of stress, marginalization and depression. It is concluded that the impact of the FMD-crisis is considerable, especially for farmers in the culled area.

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Published

2004-03-01

Issue

Vol. 51 No. 4 (2004)

Section

Papers

License

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