Chewing the fat with a group of farm animal vets recently, the
conversation took a particularly interesting turn: Why so many farmers
fail/refuse to heed their oh-so-wise advice.
This was a knowledgeable and highly experienced group of people. Their
specialism happened to be sheep, although that is somewhat incidental to what
follows and could have involved any species or disease. The group’s concern
boiled down to this: Some farmers allow sheep health to be compromised by poor
decisions, or indeed no decision at all. So they would be losing money compared
to effective or optimal strategy. They were probably inflicting pain and
suffering too. And their behaviour wasn’t making sense to their genuinely
concerned veterinary advisers.
These are sentiments I’ve shared on and off for more than 30 years
working in the agri-supply sector. They resurfaced again recently during the
launch of the National Youngstock Association and its inaugural conference,
attended by more than 200 concerned individuals, at Hartpury College in June.
The NYA instigators’ noble purpose is to tackle the largely avoidable
losses during the rearing phase of young cattle, dairy and beef alike. The
stats are truly appalling:
· 8% of calves are born dead or die within
24 hours of birth;
· among dairy calves, 6% of those born
alive fail to reach weaning; a further 3% fail to reach 6 months old; and another
5% die before calving; in total, that’s 14% mortality from dairy heifer live
births;
· in beef calves, 8% of those born alive die
during rearing;
· and 15% of dairy heifers that do have a
first calving are culled before their second.
Clearly, in helping farmers reduce calf mortality and maintain better
animal health, the National Youngstock Association could create lasting gains
to bottom line profits. Similarly, our group of sheep vets could help many more
clients improve their flock performance, thereby making more money and
improving on-farm morale, if only more farmers heeded the oh-so-wise advice
that’s easily available.
However, it’s slowly become apparent to me that there is something in
the agri-industry’s education, or collective mindset, or the tea we drink, that
makes service-providers like us want to improve every farmer’s lot, without
exception, whether they want it or not. Maybe it’s origin is envy? Some of us
working in the agri-supply chain, vets included, are frustrated would-be
farmers who, but for an accident of birth, would be doing things right in the
first place for ourselves. So I hope it’s understandable if we get frustrated
from time to time when obvious (to us) changes for the better are shunned, or
mis-interpreted, or implemented half-cock.
Sometimes, of course, it will be our fault for not selling the
solution effectively, not explaining a process clearly, or not understanding
our farmers’ motives and priorities. We really cannot duck our responsibility
to be proactive if we want to be effective and successful ourselves. However,
the reality is that no matter how much we work on our persuasive skills, pitch
our propositions with benefit statements, and strive to unlock farming’s
mysterious collective psychology, we can only help those who want to be helped.
The view among sheep vets reached this conclusion really quite
quickly. They happened to be discussing control of gastrointestinal worms, and
the very real threat posed by the development of resistance to anthelmintics in
those parasites. Early on in the conversation, this was regarded as a macro,
pan-industry problem in need of an equally pan-industry solution. However, even
if government were to introduce legal requirements for treating sheep, the vets
saw that a few rogue or “idiot” sheep owners would still not comply, thereby
putting at immediate risk their close neighbours and via them, the remainder of
the sheep farming sector too.
The solution, of course, is obvious once we drop our naïve mission to
help every farmer become a potential Sheep Farmer of the Year or RABDF Gold Cup
winner. It’s a matter of individual responsibility for each farmer to take
effective steps to minimise the threats and risks to their assets and
production systems. And the vets’ conclusion? “Concentrate your energy, skills
and experience to help those who want to be helped; and for the sake of your
own sanity, ignore the rest.” Pragmatism rules, OK!
