FCN welcomes opportunities to work with research teams and collaborate on reports and papers to provide insights into the experiences of farmers and farming families.
Research helps us to better understand and represent the wellbeing interests of farmers to policy and decision makers, whilst also helping to tailor our support and services.
We have access to a wide network of farmers and have in-house specialist research communications knowledge to help promote and publicise research and findings. We can also sit on advisory boards or steering groups as part of research projects.
Please contact Alex Phillimore, Head of Operations and Communications, on alex@fcn.org.uk if you are involved in research or planning any studies and may like to work with FCN.
FCN / Len’s Light Nuffield Farming Scholarships: ‘No farmer is an island – Supporting the Mental Health of Farm Families (2025)’ and ‘From Isolation to Integration: Boosting Social Wellbeing in Agricultural Communities (2026)’
The Farming Community Network (FCN) has teamed up with Nuffield Farming Scholarships Trust (NFST) to launch a new scholarship – which will support the health and wellbeing of people in the farming community.
The Scholarship is inspired by Warwickshire farmers Andy and Lynda Eadon, who lost their son Len to suicide in January 2022. They have since made it their mission through the Len’s Light campaign to raise awareness of the challenges of mental health in rural and farming communities and to ensure that nobody feels alone.
Through this Scholarship FCN is sponsoring Nuffield Scholar Sharon May, who is exploring the topic of ‘No farmer is an island: supporting the mental health of farm families’. Read more here: Sharon May | Nuffield Farming Scholarships
FCN is also sponsoring Nuffield Scholar Alix Ritchie, who is investigating how farming communities around the world are responding to challenges through grassroots initiatives, policy interventions, and innovative models of community engagement. Read more here: Alix Ritchie | Nuffield Farming Scholarships
The role of agronomists, contractors, landlords’ agents, and other so-called ‘accidental counsellors’ in supporting farmers’ mental health (2026)
FCN is a member of the Agri-Wellbeing Alliance. Harper Adams University, supported by the Agri-Wellbeing Alliance, has published research on the role of ‘accidental counsellors’ in farming. The research found that farmers may share worries with allied professionals because they have developed trusted relationships with them and might not regularly encounter other people in isolated rural communities. Therefore, these accidental counsellors are likely an important part of the ‘safety net’ for farmer mental health.
Download the 2026 paper below:
Health and Wellbeing of Women in Farming (2025 – 2027)
FCN is working on a 3-year research partnership with the University of Exeter’s Centre for Rural Policy Research, funded by the ESRC.
Through surveys and detailed interviews, this new study will provide insights into the farming and gender-specific stressors that can affect women in agriculture – and the impacts on both their physical and mental health and wellbeing.
It will also explore the ways in which women experience and understand their health through, and in relation to, their bodies – with a focus on how this may change across the life-course, during periods of high stress or trauma, and in relation to their reproductive lives.
Preliminary findings have shown that feeling valued and involved in decision-making is associated with higher mental wellbeing for women in farming. Access the papers here: Publications > Health and Wellbeing of Women in Farming
Rural Communities Cancer Project – cancer in farming and rural communities (2025 – 2027)
FCN is working in partnership with Macmillan Cancer Support to raise awareness of cancer in farming and rural communities, and to improve the support available to people living with cancer. This survey is helping us to better understand current service provisions in rural areas, whilst recommending areas for improvement. All are welcome to fill in this survey, whether you have personally had a cancer diagnosis or not.
English survey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/W9DQM5M
Welsh survey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/LM2M265
Finding the Box-Top: Addressing the human cost of bTB (2025)
FCN commissioned this report on the impact of bTB on farmers throughout the UK. The aims were three-fold: listen to farmers’ voices on the impact and concerns generated by bTB in an evolving policy context; increase awareness of such concerns; and identify any policies or other moves that could ease the pressure on farmers and support the goal of eliminating bTB.
Download the report, ‘Finding the Box-Top: Addressing the human cost of bTB’ (2025), here:
Following the publication of this report, FCN’s Chief Executive Officer, Dr Jude McCann, responded to an EFRA Committee inquiry investigating preparedness and response measures to animal diseases, their financial consequences and their impact on mental health in farming communities. Watch a clip below:
This research builds upon a 2009 report produced by FCN into stress and loss associated with bTB. Download this here:
Farming Help charities seek farmers’ views on current challenges (2025)
The Farming Help charities (The Farming Community Network and Addington Fund) are seeking the views of UK farmers – to help ensure their support and services continue to meet the evolving needs of farming people.
The charities have launched a new survey to gather feedback directly from farmers. This includes assessing which areas are most pressing or causing the most stress – such as succession planning, mental health and wellbeing, labour shortages or financial sustainability.
As the charities embark on their new organisational strategies, they wish to ensure that their support services continue to meet the real, present-day needs of the farming community – whilst identifying any gaps in support that may be present. Access the survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/ZJKGVK7
Neurodiversity in farming (2025)
FCN is supporting the Farmers Weekly ‘Level the Field’ campaign, exploring neurodiversity in farming. Research as part of this campaign has shown that neurodiversity in farming may be double rate of general public. Download a report from this research below:
Challenges and entrepreneurial opportunities for hill and upland farmers post-Brexit (2024)
FCN contributed the preface to a report and worked alongside researchers from the University of Leeds Business School exploring the constraints and challenges facing hill and upland farmers in adapting to post-Brexit schemes; and identifying potential opportunities for farmers to help manage their businesses successfully following the rollout of new schemes.
Supporting UK farmers towards net-zero agriculture (2023)
FCN has worked with researchers from the University of Leeds on an article about the increasing legislative and societal pressures for agriculture to meet net-zero ambitions and the importance of ensuring farmers are not ‘left behind’. FCN is collaborating with the research team to further understand the complexities of adopting Environmental Land Management Schemes (ELMs) and to better support farmers in navigating these changes.
Read the article here: Supporting UK farmers towards net-zero agriculture
FCN contributes to House of Commons Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (EFRA) Committee report into Rural Mental Health (2023)
Evidence provided by FCN has contributed to a House of Commons report published by the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (EFRA) Committee into rural mental health: https://committees.parliament.uk/publications/39991/documents/195139/default/
This includes research conducted by FCN and the University of Exeter’s Centre for Rural Policy Research into loneliness and isolation in rural communities (details below), and information regarding support provided by our volunteer network to the farming community.
Survey into what farmers are most proud of about UK agriculture (2023)
The Farming Help charities (FCN and Addington Fund) ran a survey of more than 500 farmers and agricultural professionals during LAMMA 2023, Birmingham NEC, which revealed a wide range of reasons why they feel passionate and optimistic about farming and food production. The survey also asked if respondents would personally speak to a farming charity if they felt they needed support, with over 70% saying they would. Access the findings here.
Loneliness and Social Isolation in Farming Communities (2022)
Long hours, working alone and a feeling of being undervalued and disconnected from the wider public are among the key factors which cause loneliness within the farming community, a major study has shown. The research by FCN and the University of Exeter’s Centre for Rural Policy Research (CRPR) has identified reasons why farmers and farming families can feel isolated and lonely – at the same time laying bare many of the challenges and pressures farmers regularly face in their occupation. Loneliness was found in the study to be linked to mental health problems such as depression and anxiety.
Paper published in the journal Sociologia Ruralis (2022)
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/soru.12399
Summary report (2021):
Hampshire Farmers Wellbeing Survey (2022)
Hampshire Trading Standards worked with FCN on research designed to better understand challenges and difficulties faced by farmers within Hampshire.
Evidence submitted to Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (EFRA) Committee on rural mental health (2022)
Dr Jude McCann, FCN’s Chief Executive Officer, gave evidence to the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (EFRA) Committee on 26/04/22 on the subject of rural mental health. Further information is available here: https://lnkd.in/e8M7vFfQ
Watch the video below: