When the Government Forgets Agriculture…
I know that I get on the case of growers about taking on the Government. I also know that you’re probably tired of hearing about it.
Tough. Because unless you get the UK Government to pay adequate attention to what you need – so that you can ensure your ability to feed the country as well as whatever export opportunities you provide – the problems are beyond financial. They are life and death.
Food security is as big an issue as any other form of security – financial, military, social and more. Just ask Japanese farmers – where 70% of them are now over 60 years old and only provide 39% of the country’s food needs. Their dissatisfaction with their Government’s decisions which have consistently undermined rural areas – for decades – now has the potential to bring the main political party down.
Now’s the time. This is your moment. The City isn’t the answer any longer. You are. Make it work for you – before that window closes.
This needs to be a two-pronged (at least) approach. First, there needs to be a concerted lobbying voice for the growers. It can’t come piecemeal. The various organizations which represent your interests need to speak as one – because they’re speaking for you. The good news is, you know them and trust them. Now get them to talk to one another and build one voice.
Second, there needs to be a concerted effort to change the image of the farmer in the UK – and, of the two, that, for some unknown reason (at least to me), seems the more difficult.
In the US, even though so much of the land is farmed by corporations, the face of farming is still the salt of the earth, family farmer. People in cities will fight on behalf of the farmer – even when the ‘farmer’ is actually a multi-national – because the farming community has, for so many years, successfully portrayed itself with a human face. More, it is seen as a stoic, dedicated group that take on nature and all its vagaries – particularly in these times of climate change - to ensure that the people of the United States are never short of food.
Great advertising.
Now it’s your turn. I don’t want to hear about the “gentleman farmer” anymore when I speak with British people about agriculture. (It’s really bad because I hear it from both agricultural and non-agricultural types.) I don’t want to hear that service industries are the wave of the future. (Food manufacturing – from growth through sales – is just as technologically challenging as any high-tech industry out there.)
Get out there and take advantage of the fact that you’re the stars of today and tomorrow. With grow-your-own and allotments being the sexiest thing going, that makes you – yes, you – the sexiest representative of what others are only learning now.
Use your new public face. Let the excitement about growing create more growth in the industry as well as greater understanding of the importance of what you do. Then use that leverage to make sure the Government listens.
They will if you do it – and do it right. Otherwise, they may end up as out of favor as their Japanese counterparts.
