My 2023 kicked off in fine fashion. Not long ago I announced that I would not be flying anymore, but that was a proclamation that I couldn’t uphold as long as I had hoped, as the timing of events forced me to fly to Tennessee and then Pennsylvania.
It did help me to cover a lot of ground in the first week of the year and my flights all went flawlessly, unlike our oldest daughter, who has had significant travel woes in the past two weeks. This is just a reminder to all of us that traveling at 500 miles per hour is a privilege and not a right so we need to appreciate it and not take it for granted because air travel creates opportunities and challenges all in the same breath.
The Tennessee event was the winter meeting for the Tennessee Cattlemen’s Association and it was fantastic. Additionally, because kids were not back in school yet, it made for a great week of youth competition like the livestock quiz bowl and other cattlewomen’s events that challenge the next generation.
The Tennessee Cattlemen’s event was a great opportunity to share with consumers the story of the importance of youth and education regarding the benefits of beef and cattle production. One of the best parts for me is seeing my longtime friend and retired veterinarian from Sweetwater, Tennessee, Dr. Hugh McCampbell. Now that he has distributed over 12,000 “stool sample” calling cards, he now shares his most recent creation, a “Huey Stick.” If the “stool sample” needs a little background, he is a veterinarian with a great sense of humor who has gathered over 12,000 used 35mm film canisters to which he adds a three-legged stool and his contact information. When customers hold out their hand for a “stool sample,” they always get a chuckle. The “Huey Stick” is much on the same order. He is also an accomplished concert pianist.
After two very good days with the Tennessee cattlemen, I made my way to the Pennsylvania Farm Show in Harrisburg. I have attended this event in the past 20 years because it is honestly the best example I have found of directly bringing food producers and consumers together. Organizers expect somewhere between 500,000 and 700,000 people to attend each year. It truly is like the Pennsylvania State Fair and each person I talked to couldn’t wait to get there and have some of the food. The food is not your typical fair food either; it is food from the commodity groups that produce food in the state. From potatoes to apples to honey to dairy products, the whole gamut of Pennsylvania grown food is available.
I was honored to judge the bred gilt show and place them in sale order. Pennsylvania had pressure, long before most other states in the Corn Belt, to find alternative markets other than commercial outlets, and many of them moved to local food production years ago. It was a treat for me to visit with these resilient farm families who have been selling direct for as long as anybody in the country. The numbers in the bred gilt show and sale were down a little this year yet they still sold all 100 head.
I am constantly preaching that we need to offer local food options to folks because the infrastructure of the global food system is vulnerable. These families are already there, and I applaud them for that.
In closing, it doesn’t take long in places like Nashville and Pennsylvania to see the massive disconnect we have evolved into between consumers and those who produce their food. My hat goes off, for the first time in 2023, to the resilience of all the farmers who have found a way to continue to produce food for the folks who work hard at biting the hands that feed them.
Editor’s note: The views expressed here are the author’s own and do not represent the views of High Plains Journal. Trent Loos is a sixth generation United States farmer, host of the daily radio show, Loos Tales, and founder of Faces of Agriculture, a non-profit organization putting the human element back into the production of food. Get more information at www.LoosTales.com, or email Trent at [email protected].