Diaries of a global farmer

Robert and I took a few days off from visiting relatives last week and toured some of southern Germany and northeastern France.

Switzerland is fascinating because you can so quickly enter another culture, language and country. Two to three hours driving and you will be in France, Germany, Austria or Italy. This also means a diverse agriculture scene.

We drove to where the mighty Donau River has its beginnings, past large blooming canola fields and wheat heading out and past small farms squeezed between the cliffs lining the young Donau River.

Read Also

Crop insurance’s ability to help producers has its limitations

Farmers enrolled in crop insurance can do just as well financially when they have a horrible crop or no crop at all, compared to when they have a below average crop

One older farmer was spreading fertilizer by hand on a narrow wedge of potato field between freshly germinated wheat and blooming meadows.

In France, we hiked past vineyard workers below castle ruins, through picturesque villages and visited with farmers. We stopped for fresh strawberries and asparagus at a market stand as we left the wide fertile Rhein Valley forming the border between Germany and France. There were fields of freshly germinated corn as far as the eye can see.

Robert’s brother, who lives in the Alsace, says the valley is mostly corn every year. How often did we tell the Africans that they should rotate their corn crops with something else, preferably a legume like soybeans, to preserve their soils for their children?

Why do the farmers along the Rhein get away with corn after corn after corn? Part of the answer is high use of fertilizer and chemicals. Another reason is better soil conditions. Tropical soils are more prone to leaching, also because of the heavy rainy seasons. But don’t these farmers also eventually rob their children of their inheritance?

In Germany, we saw many buildings with solar panels covering the whole roof. One new farm had panels covering all the buildings. The German government is a strong supporter of alternative energies. Wind generators top many hills in the Black Forest.

One trucking firm runs some of their trucks on pure canola oil. The German village of Stuehlingen, three kilometres from our border village of Schleitheim, produces 30 percent of its own power using solar energy and biogas. Numerous villages have their own biogas facilities. Corn and wheat are now produced to generate power, not just fuel.

When I hear of large acreages of feed grains going toward power or fuel, I feel uneasy. I remember discussions we had in Africa about food versus fuel, discussions that are being held all over the world.

Food grains are used to produce power and fuel, to enable the western culture to keep a lifestyle that we know our earth could not support if all of its inhabitants were to live like us, or, we are told, cannot support at the level the world’s population lives now.

I want the poor to have a better lifestyle but am I prepared to pare down my own lifestyle in order for them to have more? I’ve been with the ‘have nots’, but slip so easily back into the culture of the ‘haves’.

I remember my economics class, the study of how to make the best use of limited resources for unlimited wants. Is using feed grains for power and fuel, especially if it means higher food costs for those who can’t afford food, the best use of those limited resources? It means good prices for farmers, and we desperately need alternative sources of energy. What is our responsibility to the poor, to our children? These are not easy questions to answer and yet the world needs to deal with them.

This is my last column as a global farmer. Next week is our son’s wedding here in Switzerland, and in mid June we return to our home in Canada. It has been a pleasure to write this column. If you have enjoyed it too, please drop us a line.