- Locally Grown Campaigns Work if Ag
Community Supports Efforts
- By Brent Warner
North American Farmers’
Direct Marketing Association
Secretary
- All of us in agriculture must realize that if we don’t get our communities behind our agricultural industries, we will not have an industry.
With less than 2% of North Americans involved in agriculture, we are in danger of becoming irrelevant. We must as an agriculture community become more proactive. We must band together with our other producers and raise our voices about the importance of agriculture across this continent, or we will lose it. We must raise the stature of the farmer as a professional. To do this we must be relentless in our passion for this industry. We must take every opportunity to tell the community how important this industry is to local jobs, community stability and health.
Locally grown campaigns will work. They will not work if the agriculture community in total does not support them, does not believe in them and does not work to promote them. We no longer can simply produce products hoping somebody will market them for us and consumers will pay a fair price. If we do not take charge of marketing and education, sooner than later, the majority of our products will come from off shore.
Farmers in North America are the most undervalued professionals. Due to the rapid expansion of production and the mad rush to produce the most food for the cheapest price, we lost sight of what our clients wanted. We have raised a generation that will pay any price for the latest technology but will search all over town for cheap food.
There are positive signs out in the marketplace. Consumers are growing concerned about what they eat. We can help them, as we help ourselves. Talk about what you do, talk to your neighbors, tell those parents at school, open your farm, if possible, to tours and promote the fact that you produce the best food and agricultural products in your own community.
Start a movement.
