Farm bike helmets flying out the door

SAFETY FIRST: Emma Gallagher, a staffer at Pacific Helmets, holds a basic farm bike helmet and wears the same helmet with the "extras" that convert the helmet for other farm uses.

The tough stance adopted by WorkSafe NZ means a Wanganui manufacturer has been struggling to keep up with demand for farm bike helmets.

Pacific Helmets spokesman David Bennett said since April last year demand for their farm bike helmets had "exploded" and he puts that down to the tougher line being taken by WorkSafe inspectors around the country.

A Marlborough farming couple was fined $40,000 late last year for repeatedly riding their quad bikes without helmets and this had signalled a rush for the Wanganui-made helmets.

Mr Bennett said their factory's monthly farm bike helmet production peaked in June last year at 1052 and already in January this year all 600 off the production line had been sold.

He said straight after the Marlborough fines were handed down "our phone immediately rang hot".

"Without a word of a lie we started selling, every day, our month's production of farm bike helmets. It was phenomenal. When it came June and we we getting ready for the Fieldays in Waikato, we had no helmets to sell."

He said until WorkSafe inspectors got more active many farmers simply ignored the rules. "The reality is the helmet will save about 40 per cent of the deaths on farm bikes. The rest are crush injuries that no helmet will save."

He said the good thing was that the sales spike indicated the message was finally getting through to farmers.

Mr Bennett said he had heard some of the corporate farms had taken an equally tough line with their employees.

"Some have employment contracts which stipulate that any staff member riding a bike without a helmet will be dismissed."

He said other industries had similar rules and regulations in place but the farming industry had "been a bit lax" until now.

He said there were 100,000 farm bikes in NZ but said helmet sales were still not matching that number.

He was on a government committee that wrote the standards for farm bike helmets about 15 years ago. While there was one other helmet being imported Pacific Helmets was the only NZ manufacturer.

Mr Bennett said his other major concern was children wearing helmets and riding on bikes.

"We've deliberately not produced a farm bike helmet for children because it's illegal for a person under the age of 16 to ride a four-wheel farm bike. I've actually warned parents when I've seen under-age children riding farm bike."

He said he still had concerns for any young child riding a powered motorcycle.

"A 6-year-old riding a powered bike? It's risky. Children simply don't have the capacity to control a powered machine or the warnings in their heads to alert them to danger."

He said Pacific Helmets was considering making a small helmet specifically for children "because there's no way we can stop the production of these smaller bikes".

The new farm bike helmets the company produces is a multi purpose one which can also act as a work helmet.