Hoosier Ag Today by: Andy Eubank
Farmers building bridges with consumers
The US Farmers and Ranchers Alliance is asking farmers to take time this year to thank consumers, agriculture’s customers. They started the movement a month ago at Commodity Classic when crop farmers were encouraged to thank customers who buy and use their products and allow farmers to keep producing.
CEO of USFRA, Randy Krotz, says farmers need to continually improve the relationship they have with consumers.
“We’ve tried to take the trust consumers have in farmers and ranchers and build it to trust in how we grow and raise our food,” he said. “We think acknowledgment of what an important role consumers have in our businesses is one of the ways to build that bridge and enhance that trust. It’s really and truly more a bridge building effort to make sure consumers get the information about food production from people that grow and raise their food.”
Consumers want to know more about their food, and more questions about how food gets to their table are coming from millennials. Krotz says farmers need to help build bridges on the issues of interest and concern to consumers.
“Over and over again every year since we’ve been created the four or five issues that stay at the top are GMO’s, usually about number 3 or 4, antibiotics and hormones in meat, crop inputs like pesticides, animal welfare. Those are the issues that consumers repeat they want to learn more about and don’t understand, and they’re some of the vulnerabilities that we have as “anti’s” or activists take on agriculture and in some ways demonize modern day agriculture and the way we produce food. So we’re trying to address that but we have to have that cultural relationship in order to make that happen.”
He says consumers want information and transparency from agriculture and he believes farmers are getting more and more comfortable filling that vital role.
About U.S. Farmers and Ranchers Alliance® (USFRA®)
U.S. Farmers & Ranchers Alliance consists of more than 90 farmer and rancher-led organizations and agricultural partners representing virtually all aspects of agriculture, working to engage in dialogue with consumers who have questions about how today’s food is grown and raised. USFRA is committed to continuous improvement and supporting U.S. farmers and ranchers’ efforts to increase confidence and trust in today’s agriculture. To learn more, follow USFRA on Twitter at twitter.com/USFRA. Visit them at facebook.com/USFarmersandRanchers and YouTube at youtube.com/usfraonline.
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