Failure to Share Story of Agriculture Risks Imposition of Restrictive Emotion Based Rules

Oct 09, 2023

The Executive Director of Farm and Food Care Saskatchewan warns, by failing to share the story agriculture, farmers risk the imposition of emotion-based rules that restrict the ability of farmers to produce food.

"Why Sharing Your Farm Story Matters" will be among the topics discussed as part of Saskatchewan Pork Industry Symposium 2023 scheduled for November 7th and 8th in Saskatoon.Farm and Food Care Saskatchewan Executive Director Clinton Monchuk says the organization's focus is to ensure consumers understand how farmers and ranchers in Saskatchewan and across Canada are producing food.

Quote-Clinton Monchuk-Farm and Food Care Saskatchewan:

We do a lot of different analytics when it comes to trying to understand what consumers are thinking and where their minds are at when it comes to food.
What ends up happening is consumers may think they know what's happening in food production and they do searches for it and searches on different search engines may produce not pro-agriculture, pro-modern farming results.

As a result of that, part of what we need to do as an agriculture industry is make sure that we are out there telling our story about how our food is being produced on our own farms.Given the opportunity to talk to a consumer, and we have a lot of data on this, when there's that engagement between a farmer and a consumer about how the food is being grown there's a higher level of confidence.

A higher level of confidence with consumers means that you have a more confident consuming public and definitely when questions come up in the future that the consumer has, they know that they've already talked to a farmer and they know how food is being grown.That's really what we're trying to do, make sure that more farmers are out there talking about what they do in their communities, on their social media network and to others who are interested in knowing.

Monchuk says we're already seeing the results of failing to tell the story of farming, in the development of policies that may not be pro-modern agriculture.
He suggests more education and engagement will help ensure the rules for farmers and ranchers are based on science.

Source : Farmscape.ca

Video: Season 7, Episode 1: Managing Risk and Seeing Opportunities in U.S. Pork Production

Today’s episode features three guests discussing the similarities and differences between pork production in the United States and Brazil, along with strategies for managing risk in today’s industry while recognizing and acting on opportunities. First, Dr. Anne Caroline de Lara, executive manager of live pig production at Seara Alimentos, a JBS company in Brazil, is joined by Dr. Matthew Turner, head of operations for JBS Live Pork. Together, they discuss how labor, climate and ventilation challenges vary between Brazil and the United States, while underscoring their shared commitment to raising healthy pigs. They also point to lessons producers in both countries can take from one another’s systems and on-farm experiences. Then, Brady Reicks, risk manager at Reicks View Farms, shares his perspective on risk management, drawing from his background in markets and his transition into farming. He discusses how protecting margins varies by operation and offers practical approaches producers can use to make marketing and business decisions with greater confidence rather than hesitation.

Both conversations were recorded at recent industry events focused on swine livability, including the International Conference on Pig Livability and Iowa Swine Day.