Occupational accidents in Swedish agriculture

Abstract

The Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences in co- operation with Statistics Sweden carried out a compre- hensive survey of accidents in Swedish farming and for- estry that occurred in 2004. The aim was to get in-depth knowledge about the origin and extent of the accidents and also to obtain information as a basis for the planning of preventive measures in agriculture. The study was fi- nanced by the Swedish Farmers’ Foundation for Agricul- tural Research. In 2004, there were about 67,000 farms with agricultural operations in Sweden. 7,000 question- naires with 14 questions were sent out to a sample of the pure agricultural farms and combined agricul- tural/forestry farms. The most important question was whether any accidents had occurred at the farms during 2004. Those farms that reported accidents were thereafter contacted by telephone with additional questions about the respective accident. A total of 5,646 farms (81 %) answered the questionnaires. About 5,000 accidents oc- curred on agricultural farms in 2004 that resulted in bod- ily injuries and constituted obstacles at work (about 74 % accidents on pure agricultural farms and 18 % on agricul- tural farms with forestry). According to official statistics there were only about 400 registered accidents. This means that only 8 % of the reported accidents found in this study emerge in the official statistics of occupational injuries. In all, at least one accident occurred on about 7 % of all farms practicing agriculture. About 70 % of the affected farms had animal production and 15 % of all farms with milk production had one or more accidents during 2004. In order to reduce the number of accidents in agriculture it is important to take effective measures.