Written by: Alan Lyons – follow him on X (Twitter): @lyonseed

As I write this we are 12 days away from hosting Dufferin County’s’ first International Plowing Match & Rural Expo. The inclusion of “Rural Expo” was probably a good idea as the actual plowing competition has long been a minor component of the event. What started as an organization to promote and improve farming practices, has become, just as the name says a Rural Expo.

The show attendance is projected to be something close to 70,000 people including some 8000-12,000 school children. One has to assume with those numbers that the majority are non-farmers.

The Ontario Plowmans Assoc. along with a number of local and provincial organizations and businesses, does an excellent job of providing hands-on displays and information for both children and adults. While I see displays from GFO, DFO, Goat, Sheep and Egg Farmers boards, I see nothing from OSCIA either on a provincial or local level. Yes, full disclosure, I am a director of Dufferin SCIA.

As the overwhelming majority of our ultimate consumers are non-farmers, be they rural or urban, it is incumbent on us, the producers to inform them about what we do and the efforts we take to produce the food they buy. While most of us do not produce a direct to consumer food product, what we produce will eventually end up being purchased by a consumer in one form or another.

While for the majority of shoppers, price is the most important concern, most still want to know that what they are buying is produced in a way that has the least possible impact on the environment. At the store or packaging level they are bombarded with an endless list of buzz words like organic, sustainable, free-range, eco-friendly etc. the list goes on and on but most if not all are nothing more than advertising. The consumer has no real idea what any of them mean but it sounds good and is a great marketing tool for Westons or Kelloggs or any of the other processors and retailers.

Many of the producer boards do a great job of advertising and informing the public about their individual products, but who is showing or telling the public about the efforts that we put into soil and crop management? The government has decreed that their environmental programs are stressing cover crops, no-till and 4R management. Many of us have been using these techniques for years, long before our government was even aware of them. This is the type of practice that we need to be promoting to the non-farm community. Our mainstream media thrives on stories where everything is tied to “climate change”.  We need to take every opportunity to counter the noise of climate anxiety with what we are doing to protect the water and air with our farming practices. Yes I know bad news sells and every news or information outlet is looking for sensationalist “click-bait” so a good news story gets little or no press. But that shouldn’t stop our organization from promoting our “good news” at every possible chance.

How many of us take the time to interact with our non-farm neighbours to let them know what we are doing and more importantly why we do things the way we do. Sure many couldn’t care less but you’d be surprised how many do, they travel the same roads we do and their water comes from a well the same as ours. I live in a rural area with a disproportionate number of non-farm residents, I’m often asked by neighbours why I don’t plow or cultivate, why I plant into a standing crop, what and why I’m spraying and countless other questions. Taking the time to explain my practices and the environmental benefits of them can go a long way to informing uneducated consumers about what we do and why we do it.

In our area Holmes Agro posts roadside signs stating what crop is growing in the field, maybe OSCIA should come up with signs indicating farming practices being used in a similar way. Signs with “Cover Crops Grown Here” or “No-till Farming Used Here” or any one of a number of catch phrases would inform passersby just what is going on in the fields.

No one else is going to tell the story the way we want and need it told, it is up to us and our organization.