Our stakeholder steering group
Our stakeholder steering group (SSG) are very important for the success of our group. The SSG support the research and work that the UCD Agri mental health group do by providing advice and oversight on the study design, dissemination and networking within our projects ensuring that our project outputs are integrated into the community and policy and ensuring awareness of the projects and outputs. The stakeholders come from relevant organisations and interest groups in the area of agri mental health
| Name | Title | Occupation | Bio |
|---|---|---|---|
| Roy Kingston | Mr | Farmer | Married to Jenny, 4 adult children, 1 son farming, am governor of Gurteen Agricultural College, a member of Bandon beef group (though we are now dairy farming). Local preacher in the Methodist church. I travel quite often. I aspire to walk and read, both not as frequent as I like. “Working and learning together to enhance rural Ireland “ is the mission of Gurteen College , and it could well be my own! |
| Susan Brannick | Dr | Psychologist and Clinical Director at Aware | Dr Brannick is a Clinical Psychologist with several years’ experience of service development and innovation as well as offering psychological consultation and training to health and community organisations. She is passionate about tackling stigma in mental health and understanding how the socio-political context that people live within may impact on psychological difficulties including depression and bipolar disorder. She is dedicated to the provision of effective, equitable and accessible services to people living with mental health difficulties. Dr Brannick holds a Doctorate in Clinical Psychology from the University of Surrey and a MSc in Neuroscience from Kings College London |
| Catherine Kenneally | Mrs | Business Development Manager | Catherine Kenneally (nee Collins) , hailing from rural West Cork with deep ancestral roots in Irish heritage, is fuelling her passion for Irish culture, history, myth and the environment through her career. She has an undeniably profound knowledge of strategic and operational management and has been working in the hospitality, tourism, Agri and local community & voluntary sectors over the past 20 years. She thrives in bringing the small detail to the bigger picture through realistic and cost-effective measures that make all interactions prosperous. Creating, strengthening and cohesively ensuring there is a warm- and whole-hearted people experience through all avenues of the customer life cycle is what she guarantees throughout in her business development services. Bringing her qualities as a life coach and facilitator into all interactions ensures the people she assists are helped in everyway with great love and compassion. Catherine has worked with Brian and Norma Rohan in Embrace FARM since 2018 in helping develop the charity and supporting the families it represents. |
| Clare O’Keefe | Ms | Succession facilitator and farmer | Succession Ireland was established in 2007 and is owned by Clare O’Keeffe. Clare is a third-generation farmer on her home farm. She has a B.A. in Economics & Sociology, a diploma in Rural Isolation and Counselling skills and a diploma in Social and Community Studies. Clare attended Kildalton Ag. College as a young student represented and successfully achieved the John Deere All Ireland Agricultural Student of the Year. In 2006 Clare was awarded a Nuffield Scholarship to study ‘Succession on Family Farms, a Global Perspective’. Her research included extensive travelling abroad. Clare is a certified mediator with the Mediators Institute of Ireland and trained as a succession facilitator and planner under the guidance of Lynn Sykes, NSW, Australia. Clare completed the Certified Farm Succession Coordinator Training in 2019 under IFTN (International Farm Transfer Network) Fargo, North Dakota. In 2020 Clare graduated from UCD with a Masters in Agriculture Extension and Innovation. We in Succession Ireland facilitate farm succession conversations and frequently work in collaboration with the existing on farm professionals including advisory, legal and accountancy who know and support each farm family and farm business. |
| Donnla O’Hagan | Dr | Assistant Professor | Dr O'Hagan is Co-PI on the FarMHealth project at DCU |
| Áine Regan | Dr | Senior Research Officer | Dr Regan is a Senior Research Officer in Social & Behavioural Science in Teagasc. Her work is concentrated in the areas of behaviour change, and science and risk governance. Her primary research interests are:
Dr Regan has a MSc in Health Psychology and a PhD from the School of Public Health in University College Dublin, where she specialised in risk perception and communication related to food. |
| Alison Burrell | Dr | Health Psychologist | Dr Burrell works for Animal Health Ireland, delivering training to veterinary practitioners and advisors in motivational interviewing and using behaviour change techniques to support shared decision-making during herd health consults on farm. She trained as a health psychologist in an inpatient mental health setting, and has a particular interest in OneHealth. |
| Conor Hammersley | Dr | Postdoctoral researcher | Dr. Conor Hammersley is a distinguished academic whose research focuses on exploring the socio-economic and cultural factors that influence mental health outcomes among the farming community in Ireland. In 2022, Dr. Hammersley was recognised as a Fulbright awardee, conducting research at the Department of Sociomedical Sciences at Columbia University and the New York Center for Agricultural Medicine and Health, located in Cooperstown, New York. Currently, Dr. Hammersley serves as a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Public Health and Epidemiology at RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences in Ireland. |
| Shane O'Donnell | Dr | Researcher; Health Promotion Officer | Dr O'Donnell is a men’s mental health researcher with a particular focus on suicide prevention. |
| John Enright | Mr | General Secretary | Mr Enright is General Secretary of ICMSA since 2012 and has represented ICMSA on many Government appointed fora including NESC, Dairy Vision Group, Farmers Charter and Social Partnership. |
| Aoibeann Walsh | Ms | Head of Social Farming and Innovation | Ms Walsh is head of Social Farming and Innovation in Rural Support. |
| Kenneth Hayes | Mr | Agricultural & Tax Consultant. Trust & Estate Practitioner | Mr Hayes is an Agricultural Science (UCD) graduate - worked post graduation in beef industry, farm advisory, schemes and farm accounts. Self employed since 2003 working mainly in the areas of farm accounts, taxation and succession planning. |
| Cormac Farrelly | Mr | Managing Director | Owner of Agriland Media, Irelands largest agricultural news publisher. i have also spent 10 years as board member to Turn2me, Ireland first online mental health charity. |
| Rebecca Orr | Dr | GP Registrar | |
| Eoin Ryan | Dr | Assistant Professor in Farm Animal Clinical Studies | A 2001 UCD, Dublin graduate, Eoin worked initially in mixed, mainly farm animal practice for Dundrum Veterinary Clinic in Limerick and Tipperary, Republic of Ireland. In September 2002, he took up employment as intern in Large Animal Clinical Studies in UCD followed by 3 years as Large Animal Clinical Scholar. He returned to farm animal practice in February 2007 with Mulcair Veterinary Clinic in Tipperary and Limerick and worked there for 4 years. In September 2010, he took up the position of Resident in Bovine Health Management in UCD. In 2012 he was appointed Lecturer in Integrated Farm Animal Health in UCD and was conferred with a Masters in Veterinary Medicine (MVM) following research carried out into Leptospirosis in the Irish suckler cattle population. Following the successful completion of the certifying examination of the European College of Bovine Health Management (ECBHM), he qualified in July 2013 as a European specialist in bovine health management and currently works in UCD Dublin as Lecturer in Farm Animal Clinical Studies. His interests include bovine surgery, internal medicine, herd health and clinical pharmacology. |
| Harold Kingston | Mr | Farmer & machine driver | Former IFA officer, & former dairy farmer. Now parttime youngstock farmer & tractor/machine driver for an agri/plant contractor. Suffered burnout on 2018, & a strong advocate for farmers to look after their mental health. |
| Breian Carroll | Mr | Agricultural Consultant/Advisor | Managing Director of Carroll Consultancy - a private agri consultancy firm supporting Irish farmers for over 20 years. Lead partner in the recently completed DAFM supported EIP - Béal Átha na Muice Project - Farm Succession and Well Being. |
| Enda Geoghegan | Mr | Agricultural Advisor | Agricultural Advisor and i am also the Staff Advocate for the organisation. A qualified Mediator and i have delivers the On Feirm Ground workshops. |
| Sadhbh O' Neill | Ms | Researcher/ activist / op-ed contributor | I have been an active commentator and advocate for sustainable agriculture in the context of climate change, most recently as the Senior Climate Advisor to Friends of the Earth Ireland. While my background is in policy, I know that the human impact of both climate change and agricultural policy changes can be profound, leaving farmers upset, angry and confused as to who to believe or what direction to take. For my own part I want to connect with farmers and growers directly and not just via antagonistic debates, and I want to learn more about the real lived experience of those working on the land, and the challenges they face. All of us care about the future, all of us care about the environment we are bequeathing to the next generation. As a climate activist I am used to managing and navigating emotions like anxiety, grief and anger. Perhaps the tools that I've learned can be useful to farmers too. |
| Aisling McGragh | Dr | Lecturer and Researcher | Dr. Aisling McGrath is an accredited health promotion practitioner, researcher and lecturer in Public Health and Health Promotion in the school of Health Sciences at South East Technological University, Waterford, Ireland. Her research area involves identifying strategies to engage socially disadvantaged groups to enhance health and wellbeing. She has specific interest areas in community-based health promotion, social inclusion, mental health promotion, physical activity promotion and gender-specific health promotion. Her expertise involve; evaluation of complex interventions, mixed methods, economic evaluation, participatory research, behaviour change, co-design approaches, stakeholder engagement & implementation science. Her PhD focused on scalability assessment, using implementation science, of a gendered, co-designed men's health initiative in Men's Sheds that sought to engage vulnerable groups of men with health promotion and through a holistic approach, normalise meaningful conversations about wellbeing among men. She currently lectures in areas related to public health and health promotion such as; physical activity promotion, behaviour change theory, motivational interviewing, campaign implementation, designing physical activity interventions, epidemiology and gender specific health promotion. She also supervises postgraduate students and is involved in a number of research projects related to mental health promotion, community based health promotion and physical activity promotion which involve working with socially disadvantaged populations and populations with chronic disease. |
| Brendan Barry | Mr | Farmer, Student Counsellor | Brendan is a dairy farmer in Kilkenny and am also studying counselling and psychotherapy, entering my final year. |
| Elaine Houlihan | Ms | Physiotherapist/ Macra President | Elaine is the current President of Macra. She comes from a beef enterprise based in a small village in Limerick called Athlacca. Along with leading a youth organisation Elaine works with GAA teams throughout Ireland as a physiotherapist. She is passionate about all things farming, GAA & promoting positive mental health. Since taking over as President of Macra she has worked closely on the Make the Moove project which is a mental health initiative offering counselling, crisis response teams and awareness talks. |
| Bernadette Brennan | Mrs | Former Principal with DAFM. Currently involved with farmer advisory and farming on home farm | Bernadette has a wide range of experience in Agricultural policy both at decision making and implementation levels at national and EU level. A keen interest in analysis of the consequence of evolving agricultural policy and its impact on day to day farming and the lives of farmers. I m very interested in strategies aimed at helping improve the lives of Irish farmers and I see a this project as central to this aim. |
| Gyles Dawson | Mrs | Psychotherapist / Mental Health Counsellor | I have worked in the Agricultural Business sector since 1994 doing various roles. Within the last 5 years I have been involved in mental health care within the sector. I am currently Director or Operations for Rural Support in Northern Ireland. I also run my own private practice counselling service and part time farm alongside my wife in Co Armagh. |
| Ciara Hilliard | Ms | Public Servant (Climate Change Advisory Council Secretariat), Counsellor & Psychotherapist | Climate Change Advisory Council Secretariat |
| Teresa Roche | Ms | IFA Farm Family & Social Affairs Chair | Teresa Roche, I am Chairperson of IFA Farm Family & Social Affairs Committee. Farm Safety is a major part of our work within the committee. The IFA Farm Family Committee provides a voice to farm families on social issues within the Association, as well as at National and European levels. The Committee strives to keep farm families notified of changes in procedures or policies, as well as dealing with individual cases that affect them and their community. I also run my own cheese company in Co Galway Kylemore Farmhouse Cheese. |
| Gemma Cox | Dr | ||
| Marcus O'Halloran | Mr | Executive Director Agri Aware | I am a FAM graduate of UCD. I have held positions in IFA for 6 years before becoming executive director of Agri Aware in 2020. I am passionate about agriculture and also farm in partnership with my father on our dairy and beef farm in Tipperary. |
| Lorcan Brennan | Mr | Training Resource & Development Manager | Lorcan Brennan is the Training & Resource Development Manager at the Men’s Development Network (MDN). His key work is carried out through the National Men’s Health Programme based in Waterford. Much of his engagements are focused on capacity building with front line service providers, especially through the promotion and delivery of the Engage National Men’s Health Programme. Lorcan is also a mentor to other health professionals in relation to delivery of national programmes supporting engagement for men’s health. All of Lorcan’s work focuses on raising awareness on how we can best support men toward wellbeing & health. His presentations explore why it is as men we sometimes struggle to support ourselves for positive health and wellbeing. Signposting services and addressing signs and symptoms of stress are also central to his work, as is highlighting steps to reducing stress through demonstrating how the power of connection can be vital to sustaining our health and living well. |
| Lynn Boylan | Ms | MEP Spokesperson on climate justice | |
| Biddy O Neill | Ms | National Policy Lead, Department of Health | Working in Health Promotion for over 30years in HSE and Department of Health. Currently leading on Mental Health Promotion, Men's Health , Healthy Prisons and Clubs |
| Veronica Ryan | Ms | Agricultural Development Officer/Education Officer | I graduated 30 years ago with a B.Agr.Sc. from UCD and am currently working on Post Grad No. 4 (I might be mad) I have worked with farmers all my life, both in private industry (UK & Ireland) for about 10 years and also as Dairy Adviser for approx 15 years and now an Education Officer with Teagasc for approx 6 years. And so far I like my job and the farmers I come in contact with. |