For want of a name our agriculture flounders

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Every story has a name – except the one which describes our agriculture.

This, I argue, is one of the reasons we struggle to tell people around the world and in our cities about what exactly is and has been the basis of our farming’s comparative advantage for the past 130 years.

Let me provide an example.

We don’t start a story with: ‘This is about a wolf and a little girl and a grandmother who lives alone.”

No, we start, “This is the story of Little Red Riding Hood.”

From that basis the rest of the story can unfold. In a sense it doesn’t matter if some of the order, the details and nuances get a bit mixed up. Everything can hover under the banner of the name of the story.

At the same time, though there may be many variations on the story (does the wolf eat the grandmother, or does he lock her in a cupboard), it is still the story of Little Red Riding Hood. It is a story of good versus bad, and a girl with a red jacket that has an inbuilt hood.

Moving into the real world, we see countries that have earned a name for something they do extremely well.

Thus, no one has an argument about the idea of German engineering excellence, or Italian design flair or a Japanese minimalist Zen aesthetic.

Even though these are a generic name, built on the products and services which reinforce the truism of the name; they reinforce the story. The story is one of clever people, applied thinking, a certain style. It is part and parcel of those particular countries’ ethos.

However, we, NZ Inc, haven’t even managed such a generic name. The New Zealand method, or grass fed, or (the meaningless) natural don’t describe, don’t resonate, don’t provide consumers with a compelling shorthand that allows them to think “ah, I know what this is, where it comes from, what it represents”.

Instead, our wonderful products, the result of applied science to sunshine, soil and fresh air, are lumped with all the other commodity meats and fibres.

And all this because we have never given what we do a name or brand (which is merely shortand for the story).

This is why I argue that the moment we name our method is the instant we totally reposition ourselves in the minds of consumers, and give ourselves a strategic platform to upsell everything from animal genetics to electric fences (as well as the method itself) to other farmers around the world.

From that point on, we allow ourselves to play a completely different game.

But maybe I’m talking through the proverbial hole in my head. Or am I?

If we imagine beyond the actuality of how we produce….

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Science has served New Zealand agriculture extremely well. It should and needs to do so in the future.

It is also that pragmatic rationale approach that has delivered and developed a wonderfully integrated on-farm representation of responsible pastoralism.

Put another way, we’ve engineered a farming solution that makes best use of the temperate climate and relatively thin, bony, young soils of New Zealand.

We are one of the few countries in the world where farmers aren’t peasants.

We tend to take it so much for granted, that what we have, what we project from (most of) our farming, is ‘normal’. In doing so we forget what it looks like.

Now, while some tourists and travellers may complain our countryside looks like a giant golfcourse, in a way it is a bit of a backhand compliment.

Our farms, from Northland to Southland, from the coast to the foothills and high country, look looked after. They look as if someone intelligent is at home and the land, environment and animals are being cared for.

It looks almost bucolic. One of (many) definitions of bucolic is – of, pertaining to, or suggesting an idyllic rural life – which while a large stretch of the actuality, is a pretty good image or association to have.

The fact, supported by billions of dollars of spending over the past 120 years, we have science to utterly back up the picture.

However, this is a synergy we’ve, (I’m arguing) never exploited.

But first and foremost though, we need to control the imagery of what and how our farms and farming looks in the big picture.

pasture Harmonies can truly represent the idea and the ideal of responsible pastoralism.

By inviting consumers to visit, we can also take part in a conversation.

For example, consumers will (probably) always want a standard that in practice is impossible and/or uneconomic to achieve.

If, when we stake our claim to the rotational grazing territory we initially discovered, then we can take part in a conversation, instead of always defensively reacting .

One of our current challenges, is agriculture attempts to defend an amorphous idea.

When we give that idea a name, we are in a much better, stronger position.

Our farming is about much more than the sum of all its parts.

We are picture (almost) perfect.

Let’s start believing, living up to and improving that picture. To which end, let’s name it, and with it the science behind the image.

(Or, is our image something we should just let look after itself, and by default decay?)

Standing for nothing does our agriculture a big non-favour

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If you stand for nothing; does that mean anything is acceptable….or not?

This is the dilemma for NZ Inc agriculture as AgResearch announces the recent success of ‘Daisy’ a cow genetically modified to produce milk with much less beta-lactoglobulin (BLG). This is a milk whey protein known to be allergenic to some people. See the NZ Herald version of the story here.

I’m not commenting on the clever science behind GM Daisy – essentially using two microRNAs and RNA interference to knock down the expression of BLG. AgResearch next want to normally breed from Daisy and see if the same non-BLG milk is produced by her daughters – a several year exercise.

At its core, Daisy is a world first, and it really is (in my opinion) excellent applied science in creating her.

What’s of greater issue; especially given the pro/anti GM stirrings that resulted from AgResearch’s announcement, is the lack of ability ‘we’, as NZ Inc agriculture, have to figure out where Daisy and her ilk could or should fit in our offer to the world.

This is because we don’t own our story.

We don’t own our story because we’ve never named it – that is, we’ve never given a title to the rotational grazing technologies and grazing in situ we perfected over the past 100 years.

It means that we have no strategic big picture notion of what we ‘offer’ the world.

In ‘standing for nothing’ we do ourselves a huge disservice.

Is it no wonder that young people, the very lifeblood for agriculture’s next generation, are turned off. It is such a shapeless industry, who can blame them for avoiding education in it in droves.

It is no wonder that urban NZ only sees and hears grizzling cockies, polluting producers and sellers flogging commodities.

It is no wonder that tourists to New Zealand (or the vast majority of Kiwis for that matter) never appreciate the complex science behind what they see out their bus window.

Which may seem a long way from a debate about a genetically modified cow on an experimental farm?

But it is the other side of our unnamed story.

NZ Inc has the opportunity to name/brand our country’s core comparative advantage – and in doing so become the global custodians of responsible pastoralism.

The moment we do, is when we’d provide ourselves with the ability to debate Daisy, determine if such genetically tweaked beasts can fit into what we proffer to the world.

Non-BLG milk could indeed be part of a suite of ‘clever’ biologically-derived products that we produce.

But, getting back to the opening sentence – by standing for nothing, we can only have a nothing sort of debate.

Should we bother trying to get consumers closer to farmers?

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It is often said that farmers need to get closer to consumers.

And while it is possible, and some marketers have set up the facility to, for a bar code (or QR code) to show exactly where a piece of meat came from, even though that’s good it’s not really the point.

Sure, often the marketer will be telling a story associated with the meat’s provenance.

However, my argument is that within the huge quantity of meat sold around the world, the brave battle of such tiny efforts is worthy but not enough.

The reason that farmers want to get closer to consumers is because then you’re NOT commodity. It means you ARE differentiated.

This is an argument that if we give ourselves a helicopter view of what we produce, and much more importantly how we produce, then we automatically link consumers with our farmers (and we should start at the consumer – the fact we can produce something doesn’t mean a thing).

By naming that method (pasture Harmonies), which after all can only be carried out on-farm, we change the mental relationship of the consumer to what they’re going to eat (or wear or put on their floors).

Imagine then, a pasture Harmonies co-brand quietly sitting alongside a marketer’s brand.

Immediately (because we’d be telling the pH story in many different ways) a consumer would have the ultimate validation of it being the way they’d farm if they farmed themselves.

A consumer could, easily, imagine themselves to be that farmer.

At the moment, that’s much too much a bridge too far. A consumer can’t be sure how ‘our’ produce is made. There’s nothing like an ‘Intel Inside’ guarantee. (They can’t with other protein production methods either, but one thing we would be trying to show/prove is that we’re not feedlot, not ‘industrial’).

And finally, want to know the best thing about naming our story, and enabling consumers to get closer to farmers?

We don’t have to make anything up. It’s all true. What we’d be doing is owning responsible pastoralism and providing a means for that consumer to feel good about their choice.

We’d be linking consumers’ hearts with farmers’.

Or would we?

If we think beyond the actuality of how we produce….

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Science has served New Zealand agriculture extremely well. It should and needs to do so in the future.

It is also that pragmatic rationale approach that has delivered and developed a wonderfully integrated on-farm representation of responsible pastoralism.

Put another way, we’ve engineered a farming solution that makes best use of the temperate climate and relatively thin, bony, young soils of New Zealand.

We are one of the few countries in the world where farmers aren’t peasants.

We tend to take it so much for granted, that what we have, what we project from (most of) our farming, is ‘normal’.

In doing so we forget what it looks like.

Now, while some tourists and travellers may complain our countryside looks like a giant golfcourse, in a way it is a bit of a backhand compliment.

Our farms, from Northland to Southland, from the coast to the foothills and high country, look looked after. They look as if someone intelligent is at home and the land, environment and animals are being cared for.

It looks almost bucolic. One of (many) definitions of bucolic is – of, pertaining to, or suggesting an idyllic rural life – which while a large stretch of the actuality, is a pretty good image or association to have.

The fact, supported by billions of dollars of spending over the past 100 years, we have science to utterly back up the picture.

However, this is a synergy we’ve, (I’m arguing) never exploited.

But first and foremost though, we need to control the imagery of what and how our farms and farming looks in the big picture.

pasture Harmonies can truly represent the idea and the ideal of responsible pastoralism.

By inviting consumers to visit, we can also take part in a conversation.

For example, consumers will (probably) always want a standard that in practice is impossible and/or uneconomic to achieve.

If, when we stake our claim to the rotational grazing territory we initially discovered, then we can take part in a conversation, instead of always defensively reacting .

One of our current challenges, is agriculture attempts to defend an amorphous idea.

When we give that idea a name, we are in a much better, stronger position.

Our farming is about much more than the sum of all its parts.

We are picture (almost) perfect.

Let’s start believing, living up to and improving that picture.

To which end, let’s name it, and with it the science behind the image.

(Or, is our image something we should just let look after itself, and by default decay?)

Pastoral method’s lack of a brand/name is the opposite of the ‘tragedy of the commons’

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Our failure to neither name nor own the story to our pastoral method is a type of opposite ‘tragedy of the commons’. (See Wikipedia’s explanation here).

The TotC was (and still is in some arenas, e.g. fishing) an overuse and overexploitation of a common piece of grazing land – precisely because nobody owns it, but everyone is entitled to its use.

In our case (NZ Inc) our pastoral method is indeed owned by us all. Having collectively invested billions of dollars over the past 100 years in improving the ‘engine’ that converts sunshine, soil and fresh air into protein products, the knowledge inherent has been bequeathed to all Kiwis.

But because of, or perhaps even in spite of, the collective ownership, there’s never been a central or top-lead imperative to name or brand our agriculture’s key intellectual property.

Even worse, because we’ve given away the I.P. (rotational grazing, working in harmony with natural cycles, understanding soils, agronomy, the nuances of animal grazing in situ), for free, we’ve never valued the know-how.

We’ve taken it for granted that there is no significance to the continuous discoveries we’ve made, nothing worth saying “hang on, this is really cool stuff.”

In other words, collective ownership has meant no one, no organisation has stepped up and gone, “well we should do something about this.” That is, it’s the opposite of the tragedy of the commons.

By good luck and good fortune however, no one else has (yet) laid claim to the idea of our pastoral method. Even if some universities in mid-west America attempt to lay claim to the systems, the plethora of names given to our method shows that, if we in a concerted manner ‘staked our claim’, we’d have first mover advantage.

The tiny, shared steps we’ve taken in developing our systems to the integrated and sophisticated level seen today, has been quite a journey.

If, all those years ago, farmers, scientists and government had realised where the journey was going to take us, surely they would’ve named the destination and/or the trip.

We still have the opportunity to do so – and pasture Harmonies is put forward as a short hand for the story we all own.

On the other hand, perhaps I’m talking nonsense and to call it the opposite of the tragedy of the commons is way out of line.

This is a debate/discussion – what do you think?

We’re the only protein production system that can say VISIT

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Forget the science, briefly, about our agriculture, even though that’s the wonderful legacy that has got us to where we are today.

Forget the rational.

Forget the food safety, the genetics of plants and animals, the fertiliser….all those things that are objective or measureable in their input and output.

For many of us, myself included, that’s a difficult thing. We’re programmed, almost obliged to look at the facts, to deal with what’s real.

Instead think emotions, hearts and minds, soul even when it comes to our farming.

Because that’s the trigger, hook, main consideration (even if they don’t realise it) for consumers.

In a sense, they don’t care about how a piece of meat ends up on their plate. They assume (correctly) that those technical aspects of creation and distribution take care of themselves.

(Heaven forbid that there’s a whole slicing and dicing industrial process that delivers that piece of protein – in a sense none of us want to overly dwell on that).

What they do care about is the imagery. The spirit. The essence.

And it is these intangible aspects that we’re completely failing to capture.

If we slightly modify what it is we think we offer to consumers (at least those with discretionary income who have a choice beyond cheap) we have an opportunity to prompt a passion, elicit a feeling.

That’s because consumers have a mental image of what a pastorally-based system looks like. The sun is shining, the water is clean, the animals are happy.

Indeed for the most part, the image matches the reality. From that point of view, we, our pastoral system, pasture Harmonies, is the only protein production system that can say VISIT. (It is also part of the reason you don’t see a picture of a beef feedlot or a chicken broiler barn, or soybean farm on advertising for these forms of protein).

We have nothing to hide, and from my experience, most NZ farmers welcome visitors. What you see is what you get and we don’t have to make up a story to match the reality.

We have the opportunity to globally represent responsible pastoralism.

We can own the word VISIT.

We can link into consumers’ emotions, and operate in that market space where price is less of an issue than perception.

To do that, we need to own our story.

But perhaps we’re too straight, too dour, too emotionless to go down this path, while all the time repeatedly trying to reinforce the science behind image.

Are we capable, as NZ Inc, of responding to the emotional cues consumers display in all their other purchases?

So, tell me why we shouldn’t be global custodians of responsible pastoralism?

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The purpose of this blog discussion is to debate whether New Zealand Inc should become global custodians of responsible pastoralism.

It is test the hypothesis that we have a golden opportunity to profitably unite around a common story and the reality embodied in our pastoral method.

To own the story I contend, first we must name it.

Instead however of debating what the name should be, a brand/name is proffered, and as shorthand for our entire story, an argument will be presented as to why we should go down this path. Hence, pasture Harmonies – a descriptor, a promise.

As with any hypothesis, any and all contentions are up for debate. The next few months is an opportunity to discuss this, and perhaps set up an ownership structure on behalf of NZ Inc.

pasture Harmonies can exist because of three major factors.

  1. The consumer currently has no way to have a ‘relationship’ with products from a pastoral origin, and just as importantly, the people who produce it
  2. There is no name, much like an ‘Intel Inside’ for example, for products that have a pasture-based start
  3. New Zealand has both the mandate and chance to stake a claim as global custodians of responsible pastoralism

The question is whether we can be brave enough to seize the opportunity – and completely reframe our offer to the world.

My contention is that by naming our story we will also provide ourselves with a strategic platform to escape the commodity spiral of death, and sell the knowledge alongside the agritech products we currently market.

To capture the opportunity inherent in the fact there’s an unclaimed global market position will take a change in our mindset however.

It would require that we collaborate – though given that there is probably a more money for us, as NZ Inc, to make from putting ourselves up as global custodians of responsible pastoralism – that could take care of itself.

Admittedly, we need to test the proposition.

But pasture Harmonies can act as a co-brand, through being an umbrella name/story, or in its case an underlying or bedrock truth that helps justify a meat, wool, milk or other product’s market price premium.

However, the major psychological change we’d have to make is realise, utterly, that we are selling much much more than a piece of meat or a milk product (if our dairy produce manages to be branded in front of a consumer!)

We have the opportunity to sell an ideal.

We can sell and have a consumer-oriented relationship that’s based on a romance + reassurance (which is the fantastic science behind our offer).

No New Zealand company can do this alone. Only together can we punch above our weight.

Or can we – perhaps we’re doomed to always looking in the rear view mirror?

What do you think?