Farmgirl was more than a little dismissive of David Carter's speech to the Federated Farmers conference this week.
He told us to, "adopt new ideas, abandon old ways of thinking and embrace different farming methods"...blah, blah, blah.
This sentence has been trotted out by every agricultural minister since butter was churned by hand. It means nothing and it's not helpful.
When will Carter and his fellow ministers realise that this kind of talk is nothing but condescending as it suggests today's farmers are slow on the uptake and are not looking towards the future.
Farmgirl suggests it's not farmers who need to embrace different methods but more the companies that represent them and the politicians who continue to impede progress by whacking on costs at the farm gate year in, year out with thinly veiled bureaucracy - Kyoto being one such example.
Mr Carter and others that repeat these meaningless phrases (Anderton was equally as good at that - his tongue could roll off thousands of them in a week) regarding the need for farmers to adopt new ideas would do well to visit the Young Farmer Contest in Palmerston North today and talk to this latest generation of farmers. Farmgirl thinks they would teach him a thing or two.
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