Actually, it’s more than that. It isn’t just that we can’t go back. It’s that we can’t even want to do it. The past is gone. It’s over. And while the future is full of challenge, it’s popping with excitement and opportunity too.
It sounds so trite to say that the future is here. What would that even mean?
Well, partly it would mean that some of the things you might hope for are now completely out of reach. They won’t come back.
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Volatility is here to stay. I’m aware of the incongruity of Leeann Minogue writing her insightful series of columns on what farming will look like in 20 years when the farmers who read it are reaching for their phones every 20 minutes to see how our chaotic and unpredictable world — whether we’re talking our financial, our political or our business world — is blowing up now.
I tell myself — and I think I’m right — that it’s like the difference between weather and climate. Climate science may confidently predict our average temperatures in 2050, but none of us really knows who is going to get rain and who is going to get blue skies next week.
Guide has also been writing articles about the attitudes and attributes we need to find in the young people who will be taking Canada’s farms into that future. We have another story on the topic this issue (Prepping the next generation for success) which, like Leeann’s columns, I encourage you to read.
Admittedly, some leadership traits are difficult to measure. Will your next generation be able to stay
the course in the midst of all the volatility they are sure to encounter and yet not be so inflexible they miss out on their chances?
It’s a question that, if they’re honest, can make today’s grey-haired generation a bit thankful that their turn is almost up. Of course, though, a successful farm is a place where decisions get made, and where the people making them know they never have all the information they would like.
I’m aware too of a bit of wisdom an uncle passed on to me when I was just old enough for it to sink in. It’s something I’ve written about before.
The worst thing about agriculture, he told me, is that it goes in cycles. And the worst thing about cycles is that wherever you are in one, you think it’s going to stay that way forever. If prices are bad, he was telling me, you think they’ll always be bad. If they’re good, you only hear more reasons why they’ll stay good.
It’s a bit of an overstatement but you get the point. Yet although we know that a couple of tough years in Canadian agriculture could re-kindle the caution and uncertainty that are rare today, we also feel our farm sector’s confidence is well placed.
The thing about agriculture, though, is that, in an important way, the future doesn’t belong to the young until the older ones wrap it up and put a bow on it.
This ability of the retiring generation to shape the ground for the young generation is the genius of agriculture. And despite all the hand-wringing, it gets done right so much more often than wrong.
Yes there will be challenges but it’s a beautiful year to see the world from a tractor seat.
Are we getting it right? Let me know at [email protected].
