Over the past month I've been on a family holiday across the United Kingdom and parts of Europe. When it comes to farming in the UK and EU, things are a little different. Not necessarily good or bad compared to the way we farm in Australia, but just different.
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Though, there are plenty of lessons to be learnt from across the other side of the world. Here's a few things which stood out to me:
- Farmers in the UK and EU are rarely talking about profitability, return on investment or even the way we would talk of sustainability. All focus is on environment, compliance and working within government programs. There is great angst (especially in the UK) about other nations (including Australia) sending product into their country which was not produced according to their own country's strict protocols.
- There is a significant divide in UK and EU between farmers and the general population. The sympathetic attitude to farmers and the positive social licence Australian farmers generally enjoy is not really evident over there. There seems to be an attitude of 'we give them so much money that they owe us, and they will perform to a standard I expect'. This is widely evident in terms of environment, public access and scrutiny of all aspects of farm life, including what generally can't be seen behind the closed farm gate. It is social licence at a different level.
- I had many farmers contact me while travelling asking what I had seen and heard of the farmer protests in the EU. Fascinatingly - very little. In fact, most of what I saw and heard in the media was on my Australian online media feeds and Australian sources on Twitter and Facebook. Not that I was glued to the TV, but I didn't see anything on the news - and my UK farmer friends seem to know less about it than those in Australia. We spent four days also in Paris and saw nothing of it. It seems they are having little consequential effect on the everyday population who, from what I experienced, seem oblivious to farmers' existence.
- Every one of my farmer contacts in the UK and Europe talked about mental health and wellbeing, mental fatigue and general lack of confidence in the future of agriculture - especially in an economic sense. It was a common theme.
So, why talk about all this from a GPSA perspective? Well, I think it's important for us to understand what is happening on a global level. It does affect us as farmers in Australia.
We are very fortunate in that we (as farmers) still have a lot of currency with the public. We are respected, and most are keen for us to just get on with what we are doing and feed the country rather than putting increasing social pressure on us to perform to their expectations.
The farm protests are an interesting one - especially at a time when we are increasingly hearing farmers here in Australia advocate for a more militant approach, with many pushing for rallies and blockades as per the French and German examples.
All I saw in the UK and Europe was farmers losing respect through their actions, less relevance in the eyes of the public - and loss of opportunity to be able to have respectful conversations with lawmakers and others who ultimately make the decisions which will impact their lives.
Having two-way, open channels of conversation between our members, industry and elected officials is a very important value of GPSA and my trip overseas certainly reminded me of this.
