Future of farming.....

[cottonpicken]

Lets keep it all here guys so we arnt jumping around.

Klause know you are busy but could you expand what you know about the biological stuff.

Can Lweber weigh in on the idea of a middle ground approach to the organic/consumer/conventional mish mash/labelling and massive number of problems,or anyone else?

What could you give up?

What could you say to the consumer-look we ****in need this stuff?

Find the middle ground,win their hearts and minds,win the war.

Because this is a war and you are losing.

Anyone?

[ado089]

I could give up everything but gps and diesel fuel. I have no idea how we have farmers have been tricked into thinking it's our duty overproduce and grow cheap food for low margins. Part of me hopes it all gets taken away so the ungrateful masses having something valid to complain about when it comes to food... Not enough of it.

[SASKFARMER]

What have j been saying for years!

We were played again.

Hook line and sinker!

Only thing a new generation didn't have fathers who told them this has happened before beware of bull shit the world is out of food!

[farmaholic]

I don't think any bait was swallowed. I think we've been doing what we've always been doing....what I see is the problem is we are always trying to over produce ourselves into higher margins.

..."over produce ourselves into higher margins".

I would think that theory is fundamentally flawed In the laws of supply and demand.

[hobbyfrmr]

Large well managed efficient farms are the future. I see it all around me and they are successful as far as I can tell. Its just business, and the new managers are better skilled at business. The next generation is less emotionally attached to the farmland and its more like a playing card in their hands to utilize to generate more wealth.
I see much smaller properties with free ranges livestock, some beehives and a veggie market garden to sell at farmers markets or roadside stands. A big contrast but we will adjust.
I do look at the cost/price squeeze that is happening now as the frog in a pot if water. Throw the in boiling water, it jumps out.
Set the frog in nice water, gradually increase the temperature and he will boil.
Every 10 years or so a primary producer has to decide to double up on acres or not.

[northfarmer]

I think there is a place for segmentation of food production at the primary level all the way from organic to full tech. The challenge is the relative size of the market and supply and demand.

We are kidding ourselves if we think we can adopt a Canadian or continental solution for that matter to the issue as we export the large portion of our production to Asia and India. Our global competition will not slow down in its quest for higher production using whatever technology is available. This market is too price competitive to have our production left out of the technological innovations we need to remain competitive or at least try.

Therefore GMO and biotech and increasingly intensive agriculture are here to stay, there will be money to be made in the other segments but hard to see it being any large volume of production.

As for consolidation and rationalization of the public companies that supply the technology I am concerned.
I suspect that certain segments of these companies in certain markets will be problem, canola seed traits being one of them.

[farmaholic]

Hobby, the large Corporates don't seem to last. Large multi family units seem to do well. The single unit large BTO with a pile of hired help and more leased iron than owned seems to burn out and crash. The best chance is a legacy farm with an interested successor.

Just my opinion.

[hobbyfrmr]

Hobby, the large Corporates don't seem to last. Large multi family units seem to do well. The single unit large BTO with a pile of hired help and more leased iron than owned seems to burn out and crash. The best chance is a legacy farm with an interested successor.

Just my opinion.

I dont know their succession plans, but I think part of the game is to be buying farmland with all the cash flow. These operators started at their family farms so I regard them as "real" farmers. I do think one day they will decide to shut it down and either hobby farm only 10-15000 acres or just sell it all and make on the appreciation of the farmland they have bought over the years. It is not my "gig" but I think it is quite fascinating. There is a lot of money and effort going on "over there".

[fjlip]

Agree BTO/rent/all hired/ leased is NOT going to last. However, family operations rarely last more than 2 generations, seem to all split up around here. Only two that have not, one is huge, time will tell.

[biglentil]

Called a progress trap its not just ag. No different than energy sector, potash, lumber. Unemployment sky high, wages in real terms tanking, debt levels massive.

[SASKFARMER]

Family working together farm will last every BTO comes and goes!
F$&k I have seen my share

One earth

Pike

Fuduk

On and on and on!

The way today is going I might be quiting also

Slow as molasses elevator

Useless parts department

Useless mechanics

Useless RMs

Useless

Ah shit golfing is way better life!

[Partners]

Local caseih dealer has large farms trading whole line of equipment already.not even done harvest yet.

[jamesb]

The future of farming--- The bottom line for me is that the world is growing and people need to eat. How the future of farming will look is the question. With two teenaged boys that both desire to farm I have given a lot of thought to position ourselves to make this obtainable. I see the successful farms around now that are now are worlds ahead of what we used to do for management and financial planning. We have great resources out there to build the right business plan
Attitude : I follow this site quite a bit and post now and then. I have to say that I am disappointed by all the negative, pessimistic attitude that seems so pervasive in so many of the comments. Reminds me of a local guy that always was bitching about everything with the farm, too dry, too wet, low prices , high ,machinery costs and so on. Later on he was sad that none of his kids wanted to farm. No surprise if the kids heard that negative attitude towards farming. I know I wouldn't have farmed if my dad talked that way.
Land: We rent land but own most of what we farm. I believe land ownership is the key to the long term sustainability. In too many places around the world tenant farmers are the norm. Our forbearers left Europe to get away from this and own their own land here.
Economics: For any system to be sustainable, all segments have to be profitable. We simply cannot produce a product for less than a reasonable return on investment or eventually the system will crash, maybe not today but eventually the equity is gone. We are sometimes our worst enemy as guys sell less that their cost of production to create cash flow but this drags the price down. I am optimistic that governments just don't have the money to prop up farm economy's with subsidies that they used too. (EU and US). This promoted oversupply.I know I'm jumping all over here but it boggles my mind how many farmers don't think beyond the pit off the local elevator or the ring at the auction mart, as though those local people had any power to affect prices to any degree. I have seen it both ways. Might have been at crop week or such but I recall hearing a farmer berate a overseas pulse buyer that they need to pay more as the pea price was just too low and below the farmers costs, as though the buyer could just as easily past on a higher price to the pulse buyer in India or what you. Or conversely I remember in 08 or 09 when pulse prices where going through the roof , at a similar
venue I had a pulse buyer from overseas tell me I needed to "charge less" for my peas as the price was getting cost prohibitive for the person on the street in India to afford to buy food. As though we have the power to set price. We are all marionettes in a global game. I do have the power to decide what I grow and sell it at a price I can live on.
I am hopeful to continue farming until the next generation gradually takes over the operation.

[grassfarmer]

However, family operations rarely last more than 2 generations, seem to all split up around here. Only two that have not, one is huge, time will tell.

That was a common observation in Scotland at least 50 years ago - takes one generation to build up a farm and the next loses it. The hunger the building generation has is quickly compromised by the comfort the successor generation assumes. The skill in being successful multi-generationally is overcoming that tendency.

[foragefarmer]

Two post above with totally different attitudes, one that is extremely positive about his future in farming and feels he can make a go of it, and the other that just ******* and complains about everything and post pictures of his new equipment and his crops and is never satisfied.

I agree with the positive poster's comments, and feel that as a farmer I really have it good compared to so many others trying to make a living. Some don't realize how good they have it.