Megan's poignant look at the tough side of Down on the Farm
A Shropshire woman's powerful look at suicide among the farming community has won a national award.
Megan Hayward's documentary, Down on the Farm, was chosen as one of this years' Charles Parker Prize winners and is part of BBC Radio 4 New Storytellers series.
The 15 minute documentary uses poetry, music and candid voice to explore the heartbreaking reality of the high suicide rates within the UK farming industry.
The Charles Parker Prize is awarded each year for the best student audio feature. The prize is open to any student at Further or Higher Education establishments throughout the United Kingdom.
Megan, a former student at Lakelands secondary school, Ellesmere, is a student at the University of Sunderland.
She said a subject rarely spoken of was the stressed-filled lives of Britain’s small farmers, up before dawn, not in bed often till the small hours.
"The multiple pressures of livestock, spiralling costs and bad weather can conspire to drive farmers to the edge of suicide," she said.
The poignant narrative was counterpointed with a lyrical evocation of the countryside.
The judges chose her entry after saying they liked its impressive storytelling – frank and raw and honest.
Judges said it included a lovely use of song and was very well recorded and professional. ‘The poem, was beautiful and well delivered’.
Down on the Farm can be heard via the BBC website bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00199y0.
Charles Parker was in turn a submarine commander, a pioneer of radio broadcasting and oral history, an inspiring lecturer and folk musician and a political campaigner.
