Sprouting Success

This year’s National Ag Day theme, “Food Brings Everyone to the Table,” could not be more fitting. Over the past year, we have spent more time than ever sitting around the table with the ones we love most. However, while many were enjoying much-needed time with their family, agriculturalists around the nation continued to work endlessly to provide for their communities. Agriculture provides nearly everything we eat, use, and wear on a day-to-day basis. Each American farmer feeds roughly 166 people each year. As the population continues to grow, so does the need for agriculture.

The purpose of National Ag Day is to recognize and celebrate the abundance provided by agriculture. The National Ag Day program, organized by the Agriculture Council of America (ACA), believes that our nation should understand how our food is produced, value agriculture’s role in maintaining a strong economy, consider careers in food and agriculture and appreciate how the agriculture industry provides safe, abundant, and affordable products to us all. I feel the same. Right now, we can all exert an influence in our home and community to tell our true and inclusive story of agriculture.

Every spring when I was young, my grandma let me choose one crop that would be mine to plant and tend in the garden. It never made her work any easier as she now had to tend to her crops, my crop, and my four-year-old self digging in the soil. But she knew this tradition helped me understand how intrinsically connected we all are to sunlight, soil, and the lives of growing things. I always insisted on growing pumpkins. Every day after milking cows, we headed to the garden to tend to the pumpkins. I always found myself too busy picking ground cherries than helping my grandma. But the summer drew on and that tiny seed turned into golden success. Early fall was my favorite time of year because the wait was finally over. We were able to harvest the pumpkins!

Don't ask me why I chose a crop that took all summer and then some to grow. But throughout the summer, I was able to watch those tiny seeds blossom and grow into the most pumpkiny pumpkins I had ever seen. There were times when I thought those vines were never going to produce a thing. However, by some magic, we had grown the most golden pumpkins ever! Even though I was not confident that the pumpkin project would work out, I just needed to trust the process.

I think we can apply the pumpkin project to our lives. Especially now, during National Ag Week! You see, a seed can't stay a seed forever. When cared for with nourishing soil, rays of sunlight, and water, they change shape and start to become whatever it is they were meant to be. We, too, are given the seed of opportunity to make a difference; to advocate for agriculture. But greatness will not sprout unless we give it everything it needs to grow into something amazing. We need to start sharing the joys and discomforts of agricultural life to spread the good word that agriculture is the founding principle of American life. Recognizing the abundance that agriculture provides is significant and agriculturalists of all kinds are among the best advocates to help bridge the gap between consumers and modern agriculture. Seeing as today’s population is two to three generations removed from agricultural life, any opportunity to inform the general public about your ag story and experiences will most likely leave a lasting impression.

When I sit with the question of why ag advocacy pulled me in, my key reasons have to be:

• I’m a fifth-generation dairy farmer, and with family farms accounting for 98% of all US farms, I’m not the only one.

• It’s the industry that feeds the world, and there’s no nobler cause.

• You won’t find more resilient people.

• To give consumers the information to make better buying decisions & show the industry that the choices they make matter.

March 23rd may have marked the celebration of National Ag Day, but for me, I celebrate agriculture every day.