Dear leaders of the farming and ranching community along with
“Agvocates”,
Monday was a good day. Rice harvest finished up and I
decided to fulfill my civic duty as a pillar of the agriculture community and took
part in a discussion at Chico State titled “The Future of the Farm”. The topic to
be debated was “Can meat and dairy be produced “sustainably” to feed the
planet?” If you’re asking yourself, “He went to a discussion most likely filled
with Obama votes, Birkenstocks, a lack of general hygiene and folks who have
never seen a farm other than Michael Pollan’s utopia of what the food system
should look like?!?” Yes, I did, but being this is the first one of these I
have attend in some time I made sure I had the natural Xanax of two beers and a
shot in me to refrain from any Tourette moments I am prone to when
participating in something I am passionate about (Did not want to disappoint ya’ll).
The two person panel chosen to debate the topic consisted of David Simon, a
lawyer from Southern California who is the general council of a healthcare
company and is the author of the book “Meatonomics”. These credentials
obviously makes him a foremost expert on farming, ranching and production
agriculture. Megan Brown, cattle rancher and world renowned agriculture and
food blogger occupied the chair next to Mr. Simon. This debate played out like
most when you pit two ideological views against each other. Mr. Simon started
the discussion in textbook fashion with pictures of animal cruelty at “factory
farms” and facts taking out of content and blaming subsidies and “corporate farms”
with what is wrong with agriculture before comparing the chicken and beef
industry to the tobacco industry and then ending with all meats should be taxed
as if it was a pack of cigarettes. Once again this guy is an expert on
agriculture. Ms. Brown’s rebuttal was informative and was presented in a way
that even the people who don’t agree with the consumption of meat products were
able to be bipartisan towards a view not of their own. One statement Megan made
that stood out among all others to me was; “We are our own worst enemy” when it
came to describing the lack of communication the agriculture industry has with
the public. I’ll get back to this statement in a moment. What concerned me with
this discussion was not only the lack of attendance by members of the agricultural
community but also by the lack of participation by the so called “leaders” of
my industry. Faculty, students, local Ag organizations, etc. were presented
with the opportunity to be a part of the discussion yet according to the
mediator declined. If this is true, I’m not only dissatisfied by the institution
that I proudly call my alma mater, it reiterates the previous mentioned fact
that agriculture is its own worst enemy. As my blog has progressed and I look
to ways to increase my reach to others, “experts” concerning social media have
told me that I need to stick with one genera when it comes to my topics of discussion,
meaning that I write about the trials and tribulation of farming. While I truly
enjoy covering this topic both in print and pictures it does not help the
bigger cause of getting our message out to others. The agricultural industry
will never progress if it continues to preach to its own concerning topics of importance
to the rest of society. Agriculture needs more people like Megan Brown who
tackle issues that our out of our comfort zone and less cowboy hats and dirty
boots sitting in the coffee shop solving the world’s problems one cup at a time….
PS. Happy hump day peeps and please forgive me for the
harvest sabbatical. Have a great one and remember….A burrito is just a sleeping
bag for some tasty meat.
#Beefjar #agvocates #Davidsimon #chicostateag #empireliving
