Adoption of safety practices on most farm and ranch operations is voluntary, underscoring the importance of working with trusted community members to help producers and their families identify hazards and take the steps to reduce the risk of injuries and fatalities on their operation. In North Dakota, a large network of trusted community support exists to address the growing concern of agricultural injuries and fatalities.

“In North Dakota, we have a fantastic network of Extension agents, rural firefighters, ambulance squads, and county emergency managers,” says Angie Johnson, North Dakota State University Extension farm and ranch safety specialist. “These professionals are community members and trusted sources of information that farmers, ranchers and their families listen to when it comes to addressing hazards regarding health and safety on their farm operation.”

To address farm and ranch safety prevention efforts, NDSU Extension has partnered with the National Farm Medicine Center to offer the Rural Firefighters Delivering Agricultural Safety and Health (RF-DASH) train-the-trainer program in North Dakota.

RF-DASH allows these trusted community partners to become leaders in farm and ranch safety prevention education and provide outreach opportunities to their local farmers and ranchers.

The RF-DASH program will be offered in-person on Saturday, Oct. 11, in Bowman, North Dakota. The event is free, however, registration is required by Oct. 4. To register, visit https://rfdash.org/rf-dash-training-bowman-north-dakota/.

“Oftentimes we become so focused on intervention practices, such as emergency rescue procedures, that we forget about the power of prevention science,” shares Rich Shock, Kindred Fire Department chief and RF-DASH participant. “Most agricultural-related injuries and fatalities can be prevented, and RF-DASH empowers firefighters, like me and my department, to work together with farmers and ranchers to help focus on farm hazard identification and risk mitigation so that we hopefully are never called out to their operation for an injury or death.”

The RF-DASH program was created by the National Farm Medicine Center and the Upper Midwest Agriculture Safety and Health Center with financial in-person training support from the CHS  Foundation. The curriculum contains five modules with a hands-on component that focuses on injury prevention and emergency preparedness for farms and ranches:

• Introduction to Agricultural Emergencies
• Preplanning and Mapping Farms with Farm MAPPER
• Farm Hazard Analysis with Saferfarm.org
• Farm First Aid
• Approaching the Farm Community

“RF-DASH is a community-based injury prevention program that aims to leverage the bonds between rural fire departments, farmers/ranchers and agricultural community members to reduce rates of agricultural injury and property loss in rural communities,” shares Tim Zehnder, RF-DASH lead trainer. “Thanks to grant support from the CHS Foundation, we are able to train new leaders in North Dakota and work on getting our first cohort of trainers established in the state — an identified need that North Dakota firefighters and Extension professionals expressed to us.”

RF-DASH training opportunities are open to firefighters, county emergency managers, EMS personnel, law enforcement, safety professionals, Extension agents, technical college instructors, rural insurance agents, farmers, ranchers and other rural community members interested in preventing agricultural injuries and fatalities.

To learn more about the RF-DASH program, join NDSU Extension for a “What is RF-DASH?” virtual webinar on October 14 at 2 p.m. CST. Contact Angie Johnson at angela.b.johnson@ndsu.edu to access the webinar link.

For more details about the RF-DASH program, including online resources, visit https://rfdash.org/.

NDSU Agriculture Communication – Sept. 26, 2025

Source: Angie Johnson, 701-231-1873, angela.b.johnson@ndsu.edu

Editor: Kelli Anderson, 701-231-6136, kelli.c.anderson@ndsu.edu