I thought I could get away with it. Remain objective, unemotional even, coolly and scientifically detached about change in the countryside. But I was wrong. (updated 17.4.23, 13.2.24, 17.11.24)
It was working on interviews with Professors Tim Benton and Charles Godfray. The enormity and range of issues on which change, disruption is happening. All the same time, rewiring our brains on how we often communicate online, while navigating a febrile post-Brexit, Covid19-fallout, war-torn backdrop, politics shifting, climate-anxious era.
Word – paper – online
Why do I refer to the ‘Gutenberg moment’? Because when the printed word (the Gutenberg press) replaced the spoken word, the online word now replaces the printed word (when did you last buy a newspaper?) Rapid-filed unchecked articles, social media soundbites, context-free headlines, deleted tweets and software skewed algorithms – all fill our timelines.
No landscape is perfect for every human or wildlife purpose at one given time – especially within a context-free smartphone snapshot
Tractors
The speed of evolving issues and communication, is breathtaking. Especially for primary industries such as farming, forestry, aquaculture at the frontline of the environment sometimes used to slower long term thinking around land use based delivery of government policy. Environmental-based primary industry policies outmoded before the ink is dry on passing of law.
“The status quo is over” a rural business leader at the RICS breakfast, The Royal Welsh, 2018
The cost is being counted in lurid ‘nature depleted’ State of Nature reports with bespoke headlines suited to a media splash, fast-moving natural capital LinkedIn-based markets sometimes leaving minority ‘interested parties’ in their wake – with unforetold impacts on rural ‘green space’ mental health.
The post-war ‘food sufficiency-at-all-costs’ generation is passing. Though they are still ‘at the table’ (see above pic) hardwiring ‘every field for food, every tree for trenches, every rural hand to work’ while society sets new demands and fresh policies. [And governments fill financial black holes without checking their blindspot.] The atmosphere of any multi-generational farmhouse is a febrile one for any business – let alone one at the vagaries of climatic and political weather.
Trees
The journey for forestry or woodland is similar to farming. My father, a onetime District Officer forester for the Forestry Commission in Cumbria, Argyll and Gwynedd, planted acres of softwood ‘plantations’ in line with government timber policy. He retired early to then become an early pioneer for Continuous Cover Forestry in the UK.
Many of these forests are now being harvested or lauded as mountain bike parks. As new planting falls behind, imports increase, other organisations take on the role of ‘public image trees‘ and socially ill-equipped carbon hunters stride onto the scene.
Wildlife keepers
All the above also applies to gamekeepers, ghillies, stalkers, rangers, wardens et all who are out there working in the rural sector. Too isolated, time poor, and reliant on others to speak on their behalf.
Adapt
This is not about business as usual. It’s about a ‘transition‘ (“just”, an easy ambition, tougher in reality). Detecting the direction of social licence while responding to a plethora of consultations while not fighting every corner, isn’t tough. It’s about working alongside other people and staying in the rural community. Resilient, by hook or crook, by sharing ideas and shelving ideals to adapt and stay relevant.
But it’s also about celebrating, acknowledging and perhaps accepting a time to mourn those who undertook farming, forestry and land-based practices within a different era. And who may find it well nigh impossible to change.
‘What’s good for farming may not be good for all farmers’
‘What’s good for forestry may not be good for all foresters’
‘What’s good for keepering may not be good for all keepers’
While change is upon us, and tribal humans are prone to airbrush out past context in order to suit modern narratives, we must try and create space for primary industry livelihoods to engage and adapt.
Human, not evidence, based
For all the science and uncertain evidence we have, humans are the key and few immersed in the topics can remain insulated from the raw effects of a transition – just or otherwise.
It’s damn tough. I saw it in my late father, local farmers in the pub, foresters online, land agents on LinkedIn, conservationists in the field. Hot emotion runs deeper than cold evidence-base science.
“Our people, language and culture are being wiped out by people from elsewhere with no understanding of the issues…it is really adversely affecting my people…the people I’m here to serve”
a rural chaplain in Wales
Nudge and graft
This is going to be hard graft. It’s important to say that. There are probably more tough trade-offs than sweet win-wins outcomes. It’s a tricky line to tread.
It’s time to remove rose-tinted glasses to make room for a more diverse range of farming and land-based practices. Try and resist feeding the media the manna to leverage one land use against another. Aim to nudge narratives on environmental nuances into the open. Tolerate alternative viewpoints on land use options and seek to bring together a wide diversity of voices.
The Benton interview is a tough read. The scale of change is writ large. The policy advisers and politicians will come and go. Long-term rural memory does not so easily. Let’s challenge ‘business as usual’ but also respect and keep those who need to be in the room, in the room.
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a blog on mental health – from my published submission to the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (EFRA Commons Select Committee – their response)