Farm to Family Connection - Commentary

FARM TO FAMILY COMMENTARY
---Select commentary from a weekly column by Curt Arens published in the Cedar County News, Hartington, NE

November 2007

Peer Pressure

Dear Friends,

Isn’t it odd that we parents continually tell our children to be their selves, to be individuals, to be the best they can be. We ask them, "If Johnny jumped off a cliff, would you?" We want them to think for themselves and make sound decisions that are sometimes independent of their friends.

Yet, as adults, we often make fun of people who do the very things we ask our children to do. Farmers who try things that aren’t considered "conventional" are often made fun of by others at the coffee shop or in the rumor mill. Anyone who is direct marketing, raising organic products, or trying grassfed, might be considered odd by "conventional" standards.

As part of a project called Farm to Family Connection, I have had the honor to survey farmers who are doing things different from the norm. Many are raising products organically, or nearly so, or they are marketing their homegrown produce through farmers markets or on-farm stores. They are working outside the comfort zone of many "conventional" farmers.

In the surveys, these direct marketers often mentioned peer pressure or anxiety about what the neighbors will think as an obstacle or barrier they had to overcome. For some farmers, it was a major barrier, because they needed to feel accepted in the community.

Isn’t it unfortunate that farmers who are raising products that consumers say they want (organic market is growing 20 percent annually), in ways consumers say they like and are willing to pay more for, yet these families feel inferior for having the gumption to follow their dreams? I think it is very sad that some folks feel like they need to tear down things they don’t understand or haven’t bothered to investigate themselves.

Rumors and hearsay can destroy self-esteem and truly ruin the dreams of some people. They are nasty and they happen to be one of the darker by-products of some regions and rural societies.

I suppose that is why many direct marketers are frustrated early on in their ventures when customers will travel 100 miles to purchase their products from their farms, but their neighbors won’t step a foot on their place for the same opportunity.

A veteran farmers market vendor once told me that the best way to deal with the disappointment of not being appreciated by your neighbors is to simply let it go. He wisely stated that customers are customers. If you treat the folks who trust you well and give them high quality products and good, friendly service, they will continue to tell their friends and it helps build a customer base. After a while, it no longer matters if neighbors support their efforts, because everyone else does.

Getting over this idea that neighbors who are farming a little differently, are somehow inferior, is imperative to having a diverse, healthy, rural community and society. In my mind, anyone who is farming in such a way to raise their family on the land, protect the environment and be a good neighbor, is someone I admire greatly, even if they don’t do everything exactly the way I would do it. I personally give high praise to all the folks with the bravery and creative nature to make a go of it on the family farm.