FARMERS and crofters are being urged to take precautions to protect their property as the number of fires in rural areas has reached a new peak.
Last year there were 343 fires on agricultural land, with Aberdeenshire (47), Highlands (44) and Dumfries and Galloway (25), topping the table for fires on farms and crofts between April 1, 2015 and March 31, 2016.
Earlier this year, the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service, in conjunction with NFU Scotland, launched its rural risk survey to encourage farmers and crofters to map out the fire danger spots on their properties so firecrews would have advance knowledge if called out to an emergency, helping reduce damage in the event of a fire – and preventing injury to the farmer, crofter, their family, workers and the fire crews themselves.
This rural risk survey has now been rolled out to three areas of Scotland – South Lanarkshire, Dumfries and Galloway, and the Highlands. However, even if farmers and crofters are outwith these areas, they are encouraged to contact their local fire station to inform them of what they hold on their farms and crofts, in particular those who have silos.
NFU Scotland president Allan Bowie commented: “Farms and crofts are often in remote areas, and can on occasion be hard to find – this rural risk survey will assist in helping fire crews to reach the fire quicker and more easily and prevent wider damage.
“We encourage farmers and crofters to take the time to contact the fire service to inform them of what you hold on your property, and to map out where the dangers are. By doing this, it could save your farm or croft if a fire was to ever occur.”
Scottish Fire and Rescue Service’s Scott Kennedy commented: “From experience of attending farm fires over the last 12 months, if we’d had the rural risk information to hand to allow the crews to be more familiar with the farm, it could have assisted in knowing what hazards there were but also where the closest water supplies were and the best way to access the farm.”