Farmers are aware of a key difference between themselves and those who are employed in the environmental community to work with them- namely, that those people are, by and large, salaried employees. They hold jobs with relatively regular hours and benefits. They receive regular pay. They do not carry a great deal of financial risk as an inherent quality of their job. Even though I’ve been self-employed for about five years now, when I talk to farmers, I’m usually lumped into the category of “employed”, and I think that’s fair. My income fluctuates according to my workload and the availability of funding for projects, but isn’t tied to commodity pricing, weather, or other factors outside of my control.
I attended a great meeting this week, known as the Ag Networking Forum, which, despite its name, is an environmental meeting. It has its name because it’s mostly made up of environmental professionals who work with farmers to try to adopt practices that will help to improve water quality and habitat. I met and reconnected and shared ideas with so many bright and thoughtful people, and I’m excited about some of the opportunities that I hope will move forward as a result of this meeting.
As an environmental community, I think that everyone recognizes the importance of including the ag community in dialogue about environmental issues, at least in principal. Farmers were given the floor often throughout this meeting to speak about their operations, their conservation practices and the current, very significant challenges that they’re facing. With the meeting being in Lancaster, PA, there was a lot of focus on the dairy industry. If you haven’t heard, farmers are in a tough spot right now, and some of those farmers are in a very tough spot.
Confirmation bias is a real thing- the tendency to interpret new information based on our perspective. We use information as confirmation if it agrees with our current understanding, and reject if it doesn’t. Listening to the conversations throughout the conference, I believe I watched some of my colleagues brush by those important comments from farmer participants in order to stay focused on the larger environmental challenges. I started to get the sense that the real Achilles heel in our efforts is empathy.
If we don’t have a sufficient appreciation for the realities of farming, and that lack of understanding makes us less effective environmentalists, then having a better understanding about the farming business will make us better at our jobs. (And generally kinder and more decent people.) Put simply, a lot of us need to spend more time talking with farmers.
There are two resources that I’ve come across that communicate this better than I can:
- In the book “7 Habits of Highly Effective People”, one of the principles is to Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood. This chapter came to mind even though it’s been several years since I read it. Stephen Covey talks about how almost none of us do this- rather than listening, that we tend to wait for our turn to talk. Instead of listening, we’re planning our rebuttal.
- The other resource is a webinar with Peter Nowak from the University of Wisconsin called “Managing Small Scale Watersheds for Water Quality”. In it, Dr. Nowak talks about the problem with calling out farmers as “bad actors”, and that what we’re usually talking about is an acceptable practice that’s applied in the wrong location or timing. (“Throwing a value connotation on those inappropriate behaviors is really hindering you more than it’s helping you.”) I’ve listened to this webinar several times, despite the unsexy title and graphics.
Maybe those resources will help. Going to farmer meetings will help more. Rather than just inviting farmers to our table, we should sit with them at theirs. Listen without judgement. Ask for their suggestions and input on solutions. Explore opportunities to partner with farming organizations. As a nonfarmer, I advocate for them because I’m connected to them. I truly believe that’s the best way to accomplish both our goals and theirs.