It was a time in my life when I soaked up information and met lifetime friends who now are more than supportive of my opinions on rural New Zealand and the fact that I’m trying my best to stand up for all that’s good in who we are and what we do, long may that support continue as I dig myself into a few holes now and then.
While at FAHS I learned the worst thing that could happen to the NZ economy was to find a case of foot and mouth disease on our shores.
We studied it with vigour and it was treated as the apocalypse should it ever eventuate into an outbreak. It has been 30 years since I said goodbye to that high school and I relish the fact that we have kept free of that virus.
However, we do have a plague or virus that has and is at this moment damaging our very existence as a country and, in fact, creating a real uncertainty in our economic future.
This virus is not from any foreign country. It has developed, mutated and gathered strength with outbreaks nationwide.
The damage the negative portrayal of the primary industry by anti-farming, animal rights, water quality and anything else with anti in front of it organisations are doing to our position on the world stage is, I fear, a modern case of foot and mouth.
The comparisons between the historical virus I studied and the modern-day equivalent are too many to list in the space I am allowed to fill in this article.
Many a commentator has written about this recently and there has been individual industry push-back by those affected by a topic such as the Greenpeace adverts and the action taken to try to negate and have them removed.
The issue I have with individual facets of the primary industry fighting its own battles is that this is a plague we all face and it’s time for our industry leaders to give as big a combined effort as the real foot and mouth outbreak would get.
The damage these emotive keyboard warriors do while crusading to push their opinions and protest points across is economic treason and will definitely be having an effect on the NZ markets and worldwide consumer perception of our products.
Don’t get me wrong, being accountable is good for the industry and it will always look to improve its science to become more sustainable but we will never convince the haters who want to rid the world of farming.
However, we must work on the people in the middle who might be swayed by the negativity and bring them onside with positive facts.
It’s my challenge to all the leaders of the primary industries to get together and work on a contingency plan to negate the emotive, damaging protests with cold, hard science and financial reporting on what has been done, what improvements have been made, where the funding has come from and the results to date.
At the moment I feel each industry is fighting its own fires and our line of defence is far too thin.
It requires a combined, well-structured team effort. If we don’t treat this seriously the momentum of the pressure against the way we all live and make a living will be too difficult to put in reverse.
Once our consumers leave us they are gone and there are a lot more patriotic countries that don’t stand for this undermining of their producers waiting to spring on any markets we lose.
I think it’s time the leaders of all our industries give this their utmost attention. Let’s face it, we, at the cold face of the primary industry, are bending over backwards to make the improvements necessary to be a more sustainable industry but who really knows about it outside those who read this type of rural press?
As I said earlier, we are not getting stuck in boots and all as a force to be reckoned with. We are allowing each part of our industry to have its heels nipped by the damage and, like the weakest animal in the herd, they are being cut off from the rest to be devoured by the growing mob of yapping hyenas feeding their cause.
Maybe I’m wrong, maybe the powers that be are working together and maybe it is just taking a while but until the day I start to see national news articles with positive spins on farming and what we are doing for our future being more prevalent than the negative stories I suspect their efforts are not working.
Right now I think it’s time to bring out the biggest needle possible and euthanase the damage done on a regular basis by the modern day equivalent of foot and mouth before it’s too late.
