The Beginning

Hello all, to kick off this new blogging adventure, I want to let you know a little bit about who I am.  I am a woman born and raised on a farm who went to school in the big city and got a business degree in order to come back home.  Many people ask me, why business school when you knew all along that you wanted to farm?  I say, why not?

During my time at school, I met many people, none who had similar experiences to my childhood, or who ever planned to set foot on a farm during their professional careers.  I befriended future bank managers, marketers, accountants, vegans, bacon lovers, and a fair amount of people who hardly knew English.  These experiences lead me to see that there is a huge disconnect between the farm community and the rest of the world.  In my mind, I don’t see this as an “us against them” situation, but a time where we need to decide what kind of tradeoffs we can make so everyone gets the most value.  It’s more the art of negotiation than being right or wrong about food production.

What if the leading scientists in the field told you that you could make your product better, more features, easier use, etc.  with less materials and waste.  Would you stop to and reject the technology?  Probably not.  Then why are we so afraid of technology that comes to our food?  Upon talking to my sister about this issue, she referred to a conversation she had with one of her professors.  He talks about trade-offs and the general apprehension people have about science.  He says we have to do research into some of these areas, like food production, just to know what we can do, and what the potential benefits and drawbacks are.  We can do a whole lot of good for so many people by understanding what we can do with our resources.  At the same time, we need to make sure we don’t get too far ahead of ourselves, so the consequences blindside us.

It is naïve to think that agriculture will be the same today as it was 100 years ago.  So many things have changed with technology, customer expectations, the number of people who are willing to farm, and the number of people in the world.  We need to use our resources as efficiently and effectively as possible in order to provide the best food we  can.  As a reader, try to realize that this issue isn’t as black and white as it seems, but rather a place where we need to find consensus.