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Care farming is the therapeutic use of farming practices. Care farms use the whole or part of a farm, provide health, social or educational care services for one or a range of vulnerable groups of people and provide a supervised, structured programme of farming-related activities.〔http://www.carefarminguk.org〕 The purpose of care farming is to promote mental and physical health by giving people the opportunity to spend time working on the land.〔CareFarmingScotland.org.uk〕 Care farms can provide supervised, structured programs of farming-related activities, including animal husbandry, crop and vegetable production and woodland management.〔National Care Farming Initiative (UK)〕 On a care farm, people, animals and the earth work together for mutual healing, attempting to alleviate the effects of nature deficit disorder.〔SanctuaryOne.org〕 ==History== Various situations and developments in the past have led people to discover the value of care farming and / or contributed to how care farming is practiced today. * Need for self-sufficiency in case of outcasts or socially excluded (incl. assylums for mentally ill) * Lack of proper, professional care facilities in rural areas (staying home on the farm) * Anthroposophic communities and other idealistic, self-sufficient communities More recently, agricultural multifunctionality has given a boost to the development of care farming. Farmers are seeking new sources of income and a reinforced relation with society and their direct customers (license to produce). Benjamin Rush (1746–1813) is said to be one of the first medical scienticts referring to the positive effects of the practice of horticultural therapy on the well-being of mentally diseased. Rush, signer of the Declaration of Independence and professor of (a.o.) medical theory at the University of Pennsylvania, published 5 books in a series of Medical Inquiries and Observations, the last being concerned with The Diseases of The Mind (1812). In this volume, the practice of horticulture is mentioned twice.〔http://www.lboro.ac.uk/research/ccfr/growing_together/Dr%20Rush%20and%20Therapeutic%20Horticulture.pdf〕 It has been remarked, that the maniacs of the male sex in all hospitals, who assist in cutting wood, making fires, and digging in a garden, and the females who are employed in washing, ironing, and scrubbing floors, often recover, while persons, whose rank exempts them from performing such services, languish away their lives within the walls of the hospital.〔Rush, B. (1812) Medical Inquiries upon Diseases of the Mind, The History of Medicine Series, No 15, New York: Hafner Publishing Company, 1962〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Care farming」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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