As a young idealistic woman coming up in the 90s, there was a constant drumbeat in the agriculture world, meant to dominate our minds to the point of erasing any foolish notions of independent thought; HOW WILL FARMERS FEED THE WORLD?
It came from every corner of agri-business, which then and now, is the primary driver of broad communications among farmers. Conferences sponsored by ag-chemical companies, speakers paid by fertilizer companies, displays of big shiny equipment at livestock shows, all of it heralding the challenge of this ominous threat of farmers being unable to meet their potential and leave the world in a lurch. Farmers particularly impotent without the miracles of the inputs and intensive management of the agribusiness overlords, offering "solutions" at every turn.
In grade 12, I remember trying to write an essay for a 4H scholarship, given the topic of coming up with solutions for exactly how we could "feed the world". I don't remember if I won the scholarship but I remember struggling with the idea even then, despite having been immersed in the North American (false) dream of bottomless soils and endless yields if only we bought the right products.
It wasn't long after that, that I encountered the work of Wendell Berry. First, his essays and then later, his poetry. But it was his essays on farming that helped form the farmer I became and gave my weary mind a life raft to hold onto in the deluge of conventional, exploitive agriculture that has been the siren song of my upbringing in 4H and Young Farmers organizations.
He was the first white, southern American, male farmer I had read who so eloquently captured the thoughts in my heart. The first farmer I heard make a sound case for small farms and vibrant rural communities based on respect for the soil and the forests and the wild places and the livestock and the people. He was the first to herald husbandry over science, to question the concept of efficiency over care and intuition. He called for farmers to be conservationists and to let the farm be the judge of its capacity to produce.
He shook loose some ideas in me that had been tucked away and dismissed as too radical, too Luddite, too foolish and wasteful. He let me shake off this looming threat of letting the world starve, while emphasizing the very thing that had niggled at me the whole time; how we feed the world is the wrong question, the wrong challenge. We should be asking how farmers can feed their communities, their neighbours. And then how we grow more farmers and encourage farm kids to farm.
Once, after I was fully entrenched in his essays, I then learned that farmers could be poets, the most beautiful of poets. He was my agrarian Mary Oliver and I returned to his words again and again, comforted by a kindred understanding of the smallness of our place in the world, but our role as caretakers and stewards of our land, our communities, our families. The real magic of Wendell Berry was his ability to put beautiful words to harsh criticism in such a thoughtful way that it didn't feel harsh at all. It wasn't urgent and pushy and loud, but it was timely, timeless, important, relevant and thought-provoking in a way that we too often miss the mark on these days of quick, snappy TLDRs.
To me, Wendell Berry's voice was a calm and quiet antidote to the noisy chanting, goading and belittling of Big Ag. Even now, I feel like I can feel him gently encouraging agrarian thoughtfulness with a "Steady on. Steady on."
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