Farmers vs Agro-Industrialist, not Ag. Critics
American Farm Bureau Federation President Bob Stallman
On January 11th, I reported on the drawing-a-line-in-the-sand speech by American Farm Bureau Federation president, Bob Stallman. In his speech, Stallman said farmers and ranchers of all types should “aggressively” defend themselves against “self-appointed and self-promoting food experts” who he said “seek to damage the reputation of traditional agricultural values.” The speech was an us-against-them call-to-arms against “extremists who want to drag agriculture back to the days of 40 acres and a mule.”
Jonathan Spero
Today, Capital Press published a rebuttal from 4-acre Oregon farmer Jonathan Spero who says the days of 40 acres and a mule may not have been so bad after all. Today, Spero says, more energy is lost in calories to grow food than that food contains, that vegetables are less nutritious and modern farms are unable to support the farmers who run them.
Spero says the divide that Bob Stallman spoke of between farmers and their vocal critics is a false one. Spero says:
There is a more important divide than the one between “modern farmer” and “40 acres and a mule,” and this is one that the Farm Bureau would like to brush over. That is the divide between the farmer and the agro-industrialist.
The farmer cares for his land. The farmer is husbandman to his livestock and to his crops. He will ask, “Is my soil better or worse than it was a few years ago?” and “Are my animals healthy or merely surviving?”
The agro-industrialist sees his farm simply as a factory, mixing biological inputs — plants and animals — with chemical inputs — fertilizers, pesticides, additives, etc. — to create outputs of commodities.
Stallman says the farmers and the agro-industrialists need to stand united against the environmentalists, foodies, animal rightists and often consumers. I am not so sure this is where the farmer’s interests lie.
Spero ends his editorial with a question: “Are family farmers really better off allied with the agro-industry?” He is one farmer who doesn’t think so.
