Iowa's Farm Safety Crusader

Abstract

<p>Farm accident fatalities have significantly decreased in the 20 years Charles Schwab has been ISU extension’s farm safety specialist. “There used to be 80 to 90 deaths each year on U.S. farms,” he says. “Now that number is closer to 30.” There was a nationwide push in the 1990s to ramp up farm safety education. “I believe education has been a big reason for the decline in farm injuries and fatalities,” he says. Schwab is director of ISU Extension’s Safe Farm program, which helps make Iowa farms safer places to work and live. As a professor in the agricultural and biosystems engineering department, Schwab has developed and taught farm safety courses, and his research has included more than 50 funded projects worth $4 million.</p>