Agriculture was the foundation stone of civilization. It en-abled the few to feed the many, providing the leisure time that is the fundamental requirement for civilization to develop.
As Ecclesiasticus puts it, “to be wise, (a scholar) must be relieved of other tasks.”
And given the world’s exploding population, agriculture has a vital role to play in preserving the civilization it created.
The most significant challenge the world faces over the next 40 years has to be how we sustainably move from a fossil fuel-based to a renewable energy economy, feed another 2.5 billion people when already a billion are malnourished and adapt an agri-food and bio-resource industry that will be severely challenged by changing climate and weather patterns. Threats to energy and food supplies will continue to cause socio-political change and chaos.
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As a society, we take to the moral high ground and uncritically consume the prejudice of films like Food Inc. while still demanding cheap fried chicken. We need to re-engage society at large with the issues and challenges of how we feed ourselves and our fellow global citizens.
After all, apart from breathing, eating is our only obligatory activity. Everything else, including hockey, is optional.
And we need to attract more young people to the wealth of educational and job opportunities provided by the agri-food industry.
The recent poll of high school students published by The Western Producer showed that the vast majority of young people believe that agriculture is the most important industry in their province.
They are right, but they have an incomplete view of the full spectrum of the agri-food industry.
We need to get the message to young people that agriculture, food and bio-resource production are vital to the survival of global civilization, that creative, engaging, varied and rewarding job opportunities from scientist and environmentalist to businessperson and banker are readily available and that more than 90 percent of these are outside the farmgate, many in the city centre.
So how do we re-engage our future generations? In our view, engagement must begin no later than kind-ergarten.
At the University of Manitoba, we have initiated a series of integrated actions to bring the value of, the sciences applied to and the opportunities in agri-food to the attention of young people.
We work closely with the Manitoba Agriculture in the Classroom organization and we have spent more than $5 million building the Bruce D. Campbell Farm and Food Discovery Centre that tells the story of what it takes to go from soil to supper plate (www.FFDC.ca).
We employ a community relations co-ordinator who works with high school teachers to introduce the value of agriculture and its science into their teaching.
And by linking our two-year agriculture diploma program with most of our degree programs, we provide a different and valuable educational experience ideally suited for a career in the agri-food industries, one where the student’s initial commitment is to only 18 months of study.
This is my challenge to our youth: if you are concerned about the ultimate fate of civilization and the condition of your fellow humans and their environment, don’t reject agriculture and food sciences just because you don’t want to be a farmer.
There are many opportunities besides farming, but we definitely also need farmers. Find out what it takes to join us, and help feed the world without costing the Earth.
My challenge to the agri-food industry is that we need your continuing support to be able to engage more young people in this fascinating and worthwhile endeavour.
Trevan is dean of the faculty of agricultural and food sciences at the University of Manitoba.
