It’s that time of year again – yes, farm tours are sprouting up across the Golden Horseshoe.
Among the interactive, entertaining day, the main purpose of these tours is to reach out to various politicians, government officials, stakeholders and the educational community to build an understanding of the opportunities and challenges the agriculture sector faces. The Durham Agricultural Advisory Committee worked to do this for the 11th year earlier in September, with a tour titled “The Future of Agriculture”.
Instead of moving around on a bus from farm to farm, Durham has recently changed the style of their tour. It is now hosted at one location, with an outreach and education approach taking place through four different demonstrations on-site (ie. this year had a mock cow show). With wagons taking participants out in the field to the various learning demonstrations, they have found this method to be just as impactful.
This year’s tour was centred on research and development for product enhancement and growth, particularly around crops and different approaches to cropping (i.e using organic matter). With that, there was also a focus on technological advancements and shedding light on where the industry is headed. The region was excited to demonstrate the technological advancements to illustrate another side of farming that offers a great career path for the younger generations. Reaching out to the educational community, research was linked with agri-producers, connections were made with The University of Ontario Institute of Technology, and there’s an overarching concerted effort to plant forward-thinking in curriculum development for high schools.
Along with the educational community, government officials and policy makers are always a key audience in these tours as well. It is important they have a sincere understanding of the sector. These people make decisions for us, it only makes sense that they make informed decisions, right? One of Durham’s demonstrations this year was on biosolids, which essentially takes municipal waste and spreads it on farm fields once it has been treated and processed. Politicians asked all kinds of questions during this demonstration to better understand this process; here we see the importance and value of such a demonstration. Ultimately, this process looks after our waste in a highly sustainable way while also assisting the farm community. It’s likely that efforts like these would go unnoticed or misunderstood without educational initiatives such as these tours.
And so roughly 100 attendees in Durham, from a variety of sectors with various ambitions, have come away from their tour that much more aware of the agricultural community around them.
Through these personal glimpses into their region’s local agriculture, participants come to better appreciate the importance of farming and the vital role it plays in our lives. Policy makers are given the opportunity to engage directly with farmers and others involved with our agri-food sector. Immersed in the atmosphere, it gets them thinking about the industry and its economic viability. It becomes the perfect platform for education, discussion and learning – for there’s really no better way to learn about something than to immerse yourself right in it, even if it is just for a day.