Women in Ag

Last week on Friday, my mom and I went to the annual Women in Ag Conference for the 3rd straight year. It is held in Rock Island, IL. We went the 1st year to support my cousin, one of the IL Farm Bureau managers there to run the conference, the 2nd year because I was thinking that I was going to be more involved in Ag with the bank I work at, and this year because I want to find something in Ag. If I want to be in that field, I need to not let myself get out of the loop; keep learning; the right time to apply that knowledge will present itself and when it does, I'll have went to those conferences for a reason!

One thing that I learned, from a popular blogger, Dairy Carrie, is that we need to advocate, or as she calls it, Agvocate for Ag. We need to be the ones speaking for Agriculture to get our voices heard. How else are the consumers going to hear from the producers?? She suggested that we try using our social media sites to Agvocate at least once a week. While the majority of our friends on Facebook/Twitter, etc. know us well enough to know what we do, what we are about, and what we are likely to advocate for, why not educate the others that may not have that direct contact with Agriculture? Give them facts. Nothing to complex but, I like just a little "fun fact". I read a blog post the next night after the conference and there were lots of Ag facts that I plan to take from to post to my Facebook and twitter pages. It may go unnoticed by many but,

it may teach a few.

Those few need the info too!

"Farmers produce 262% more food with 2% fewer inputs compared to 1950. Biotechnology also saves the equivalent of 521,000 pounds of pesticides each year and helps cut herbicide runoff by nearly 70%. Today it takes less than half as much land to produce our meat, dairy and poultry supply compared to 45 years ago."

 

Ag in the Bible

Cody and I went to an Illinois Farm Bureau Young Leader Conference, held annually in Bloomington, IL last week. The conference offers different speakers with different topics (4 separate sessions  in the morning, offered twice (so that you can hear about more than 1 topic you might favor); 4 separate sessions after lunch, offered twice; and 4 separate sessions before dinner, offered once.) We listened to Katie Pratt, a women I have heard speak at a Women in Ag Conference 3 years ago. She and her husband farm in Northern Illinois (and blogs at illinoisfarmgirl.wordpress.com.) We actually attended an afternoon session of her's and one from the final session.
During the first session, Katie talked about "Telling our story". She says that while it is important that we advocate for agriculture, it isn't our responsibility to promote, advocate, defend, or condemn other's ag practices. She says that rather than supporting conventional farming and condeming organic (or visa versa) we rather need to support our own practices, keeping opinions of other's practices, to ourself. We, as farmers, farm in the way that works best for us, as they (other farmers in general, regardless of their practices) farm in the way that best works for them.
As a closing for our "Telling our story", Katie shared a few blogs that she follows and I have since began to follow some of them too. One is called, slowmoneyfarm.wordpress.com. This farm practices things that I have not often grown up knowing much about. Their income comes from their animals mostly, but not from selling their meat, but rather their waste....as compost. They raise chickens and rabbits, which make good additions to gardens. They sell compost/manure, manure tea, feathers, angora felting fiber, yard waste, earth worms, started plants and tree seedlings. (they have an interesting story!!)
Anyway, to make my point for my title of this blog, Ag in the Bible, the writer of slowmoneyfarm.wordpress.com often posts in reference to this very title. I myself am a Christian and involved in Ag, so I was naturally drawn to such a topic. I found this exerpt from the book, Wisdom for Everyday Living by Ron Hindt, Senior Pastor, Calvary Chapel, Houston Texas.

God often refers to his children as sheep. Psalm 95:7 reads, “For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand.“ Sheep have several unique characteristics. First they cannot protect themselves. They are defenseless animals. Second, they easily wander from the shepherd’s path, so they must be watched over constantly. Third they must be led to food and water.Unlike most animals,they have no natural sense of what is good or bad for them. Fourth, they must be constantly cleaned. Their skin is naturally greasy, which causes their wool to pick up everything in their environment, such as burrs, seeds, dirt and bugs. Without constant tending, sheep make a mess of themselves. Fifth, because of their natural tendency to pick up all kinds of parasites and diseases, the shepherd must look over each of his sheep daily to make sure that none is infested.

When we mull it over, it seems as though God created sheep specifically to be a spiritual example for his people.

What a thought. I have always looked at sheep in the bible as a reference of purity, not vulnerability. We are but sheep in his world of a pasture.