Farmers have a lot of lifting and shifting and rearranging we do in our sheds and workyards. We get into awkward postures when performing machinery maintenance and other tasks.

Get organised

• Don't be a hero! Use the machinery & tools you have available to lift heavy objects or position yourself appropriately to the work at hand
• For concrete floors, you can purchase a hand pallet jack for $200-300, they are 'gold'!
• Special tools to create higher downward force for undoing nuts and other items are cheap and easily available on websites like ebay
• Electrical or battery operated tools can reduce the manual force required

Awkward positions are sometimes unavoidable, especially when performing machinery maintenance. Arm yourself with some good tools to help reduce this manual stress on your body.

Establish some workplace exercises and stretches to be done after awkward work.

Livestock!

Manual handling within livestock is a whole chapter on its own!! There are some fantastic industry resources available on the internet regarding manual handling and livestock.

Training for handling livestock is paramount, be that outsourced courses or internal training on the farm.

I offer more specific assistance to my members and clients

Resources freely available online:

• Guide to Manual Handling - Worksafe VIC
• Hazardous Manual Tasks - Code of Practice
• Manual Handling - Peak Physiotherapy
• Woolshed Safety - Ag Health
• Safework Aust - Managing the Risks of Cattle