October is Agriculture Month in Saskatchewan, and a Saskatchewan farmer is promoting the the province’s food supply and the commitment of farmers, in keeping with this month’s theme of Our Food has a Story.
Adrienne Ivey’s family has a cattle ranch near Ituna in east-central Saskatchewan. She started a blog, View from the Ranch Porch, which studies how food is produced in the province. This month she has been posting stories on her blog, each using the hashtag for the Agriculture Month theme.
She was already active on social media when she started the blog a couple of years ago.
“I just needed a little more room to really be able to fully explain how things are done on our ranch, and my views and opinions on agriculture and food,” said Ivey.
Ivey decided to start the blog when she heard views about Saskatchewan food from people who aren’t connected to the farm.
“I listened to them and saw the kind of information that was out there on social media and on the Internet,” said Ivey. “I knew that people had a lot of questions, and there were a lot of really false answers out there, and I wanted to be able to take any chance that I could to counter that information with the truth about what happens on a Saskatchewan farm.”
A lot of people have chosen fear-based marketing when it comes to food, she said, and Ivey believes that fear sells.
“That is the biggest thing that modern agriculture ends up against, is the fear around words like antibiotics, hormones, GMOs (genetically modified organisms), all these things that people will admit that they don’t completely understand, but sound scary to them,” said Ivey. “They’ve all read something somewhere that tells them they should be scared of these things.”
But science tells people something different, so it’s important for them to hear the science-based arguments.
Science can be hard to understand, and difficult to get excited about. Ivey, who has a bachelor of science in agriculture from the University of Saskatchewan, admits that when she has a question, she doesn’t always sort through scientific journals and data, so she believes it’s important for farmers to make it easier and fun for people to connect their food with the people who are growing and raising it.
She applauds the Government of Saskatchewan for this year’s theme. It recognizes the disconnect between farmers and consumers. In her case, Ivey wants to provide a forum to be able to tell stories and share experiences with people in Saskatchewan who don’t have the opportunity to live the ranch life like her.
“I think that any time people help share our stories of the farm, it’s very important, and something that we all need to take some ownership in, and help them use that opportunity to share our stories with as many people as we can,” said Ivey.
Every conversation that a Saskatchewan producer has regarding farms and ranches is a step forward, she said.
“I don’t think that creating change is something that can happen overnight, but if we all take part, and we all do the small pieces that we can, then things will definitely change,” said Ivey.
Ivey grew up on a grain farm and always thought she would work in agriculture in some fashion. She met her husband in university and they now live on his family’s ranch.
Their operation has about 1,000 mother cows and 1,000 yearlings. They own their animals from birth until they are processed for food.
“We’re really happy that we can see every step along the way, and have a piece in knowing exactly how all of those parts of the beef system work,” said Ivey.
