Farming is a demanding job saddled with stressors like increasingly unpredictable weather, rising input costs and changing commodity prices. On top of those issues, producers of color deal with the impacts of racism, which is linked to mental health conditions like depression and PTSD.
For years, mental health issues have been rising among people living on America’s farms and rural spaces. In Oklahoma, agriculture is a major sector of the economy. There were more than 70,300 farms in 2022, according to the latest Census of Agriculture from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Suicide rates are climbing faster in rural areas. They grew 46% in rural areas compared to about 27% in metro areas from 2000-2020, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Farmers and ranchers also have higher rates of depression and face barriers to accessing mental health care services, such as traveling longer distances to receive care, affording the costs of services and a shortage of behavioral health providers.
Although Black people often have higher rates of psychological distress than their white counterparts, they are less likely to receive care and get poorer quality of care. In 2018, Black people were also 1.5 times more likely to be uninsured than white people.
For decades, the number of Black producers and the amount of land they own has been sharply declining. One study found Black farmers lost about $326 billion in land wealth and income from 1920-1997. Historic discriminatory practices by the U.S. Department of Agriculture are a factor leading to the loss.
Today, socially disadvantaged producers, especially Black farmers, operate with a higher level of risk and get less government payments, according to a USDA survey. From 2018 to 2020, Black-owned farms were less than a third of the size of operations owned by farmers of other races. Stigma, lack of insurance coverage and travel distance are a few barriers preventing many rural residents from seeking mental health services, according to the Rural Health Information Hub.
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