Drones On the Farm Part 2: Rights and Expectations

I wrote last in Part 1 about a Kickstarter campaign to get drones to investigate farms. Here's a link to the main guy being interviewed about his plan. Mr. Potter actually comes across as more farm friendly than the host in that he only assumes farms are guilty until proven innocent where as she condemns them with zeal. For the purpose of the interview I'm pretty sure the phrase factory farm was interchangeable with animal cruelty.

They both agreed that the drone plan to investigate farms would circumvent the so-called ag gag law and that they have the right to see everything that occurs on farms using whatever technology is available.

Rights and Expectations

While we have the right to buy things, I'm not sure we have the right to do everything this campaign wants. On the other hand, I do think consumers have certain expectations. They have expectations that when they purchase a product or service that it will be produced at a certain moral and ethical level. Different things change their expectations, for example the worries that this Kickstarter campaign's backers have in that animal cruelty is happening on farms. That lowers their expectations of food and they are either more reluctant to purchase "common" food, thereby lowering its value, and/or more likely to purchase food they perceive, whether it actually is or not, to be closer to the expectations they want. Farmers markets, Whole Foods, and Chipotle come to mind for places that appeal to consumers' higher expectations.

Farmers, and the ag community, have to work to meet consumers' expectations. In a capitalistic society producers who make the products that consumers want at the right price survive. How are farmers meeting expectations? One way we are doing it in the dairy industry is through certification. We sell our milk through a cooperative called DFA. The processors that DFA sell our milk to have expectations on how it should be produced. DFA started a third party verified farm certification process called Gold Standard Dairy in order to prove the milk they sell meets a certain level of expectations. By doing so they raise the value of all their members' milk.

But this Kickstarter campaign thinks it has the right to come on farms and if farmers don't let them they must have something to hide. There are several reasons a farms might not allow visitors. Some don't allow them because visitors bring diseases with them that could infect the animals. Others worry about liability and lawsuits. For example, our county went without a farm for a farm day tour for several years because no one was willing to risk the liability.

Another reason might be simply that like the kid that is embarrassed that his room isn't clean enough for his mom, some farms might not think their farms are "nice enough" for company. I have to admit we have some weeds and rusty machinery around that I would hate to represent our farm in photos. Maybe some farmers are simply scared of being misrepresented by those whose only goal is to make the farmer look bad. No wonder they oppose the drones.

Regulations

Farms don't get a free pass, however, if they choose not to be open to the general public. As a grade A dairy farm we are inspected by state and federal inspectors. There is no warning when they will arrive to make sure all of our milking equipment is clean and in order. Larger farms have to meet more government regulations and can be inspected by multiple government departments. 

Regulations give us the expectations that businesses are operating at a certain set of standards. While I may not have the right to walk through the kitchen of my favorite restaurant to make sure everything meets my standards, I do have the assurances that it is inspected and has a health department score sheet hanging in public view. If it doesn't meet my expectations I can choose to eat somewhere else. 

Having choices is what the free market is all about. Look at the smartphone market. You can get a phone at various price levels that have varied features and operating systems. No one is telling  Apple or Samsung to make all phones identical and to one particular set of standards because "that's the way I think it should be." No, if you don't like the way one phone is made or works, then you, the consumer, can choose to buy something else. Just like you can choose to buy grass fed beef, free range eggs, or organic milk. 

Part 3: Family or Factory

Drones On Farms (Part 1)

Imagine an afternoon when all the stars have aligned, you have completed all your work, you're alone, and have nothing to do. I know it never happens, but lets imagine it anyway. You check your doors and windows and make sure they're locked, then you yawn, and start a nice afternoon nap.

Suddenly you are awakened by a bright flash. Before you can say, "holy cheese and crackers (instead of something unprintable on this blog!)," you see a man standing in your bedroom taking a picture of you sleeping with drool on the pillow and everything. But what's more, the man is not just any man, he is part of the self proclaimed Behavior Police. He's looking out for all of us.

What offends you the most about this hypothetical?

• Breaking and entering your house?
• The invasion of privacy and posting of your sleeping and drooling photo on the internet?
• The fact that he's reporting on your behavior to see if you live up to his standards?

Personal Space

We all have personal space, whether we're on a crowded bus or in our house. We have expectations about how other people interact with that. For instance, if you have a door to your house, which I assume everyone does, you would expect someone, a stranger, to knock before entering. If your door was locked you would expect it to keep them out. Let's say you have a yard of any size. Do strange people play in  your yard? No. It is your space. Like your house, other people should ask before they "play" in your yard or come into your house. 

Does that sound logical?

Drones Are All Seeing

Farms are no different than houses and yards. Farms have fences and gates and these define property lines. They define personal space for the farm. In other words, just like you should knock before entering someone else's house, you should ask the property owner for permission before going on a farm. 

Unlike people, drones can fly right over fences, and barns, and houses. They can choose to ignore personal space and property lines and courtesy. Drones are all seeing. Go ahead and ask Tom Cruise if you don't believe me.

And according to one meme making its way around the internet and the following Kickstarter group that kind of thinking is okay. They want to use drones to fly over farms to make sure the farmers are behaving correctly. They want to investigate "factory farms." Unlike most normal people, they are choosing to ignore courtesy and want to, figuratively if not literally, break down gates and fences and enter farms whenever they choose. When the police do this they have to have a search warrant or probable cause.

But obviously this group, while they are completely behind free speech, don't care about privacy, or at least other people's privacy. 

All people are not good. We have prisons to prove this. And I'm not saying all farmers are good. There are farmers that make mistakes, or do wrong on purpose just like they are people who make mistakes and do wrong on purpose in every walk of life. 

What I am questioning is the use of drones to spy on people and report on their behavior, and not just because someone-has-to-make-sure-people-aren't-making-bad-choices, but also for a profit (think tv promos, book deals, and speeches). Where does it go from here? Should we use drones to check up on over weight people to make sure they don't pig out on Oreo's in the privacy of their own home? Isn't it in the public's best interest that people eat healthy? Should drones sit in bathroom stalls of restaurants and report on the cooks' hand washing habits? Someone needs to make sure they don't make customers sick, right? 

Where does it end?  

Part 2: Rights and Expectations

Talking With My Mouth Full

Friday I dvr'd the Today show so I could watch a story on the Hobbit movie. Little did I know that another fantasy type story would follow it with Mark Bittman fixing a pork supper. Now I, or perhaps I should say the cows, have not agreed with Mr. Bittman's opinions before and this time was no different. The pork roast and fixins looked delicious when he was finished, there is no doubt about that, but it was the comments made about the pork that I am at odds with.

He began by talking about how industrial raised pork has lost its flavor and how you can only get the best by getting sustainable, naturally raised, local pork. He went on to say that you have to buy very expensive pork for it to be any good. I didn't really need my HDTV to see him very clearly looking down his nose at me. I had just finished the leftover Boston butt pork roast my wife had purchased on sale and turned into barbecue and thought it was good. Now that I had been informed how cheap the meat was I have realized that it actually didn't taste good at all. Right.

Now don't get me wrong, I want high quality food for my family, and if some production method is proven to be harmful then I don't want to be a part of it. I want quality raised animals for my family. While some people still brag about the things they own in order to feel more important, one of the newer ways is to brag about how much better your food is than theirs as in the pork example I started this with. The other way is to make you feel guilty about your food purchases.

How guilt free do you want to be in your meat purchasing? Whole Foods Market has a 5 Step Animal Welfare Ratings Standards so you can decide which purchase makes you a better person. Should you pick from #1, which is only no crates or no cages, or #5 where they are raised animal centered on one farm? Obviously the only way you can sleep at night is to choose #5, or none at all. This is not a sane way to be well informed on your meat purchases.

Maybe the food critics that are supposed to be leading us to better fortunes should focus more on how to prepare food in healthier ways that are actually tasty and affordable for regular people instead of insisting on assuaging our new found guilt by way of high dollar, pristinely raised food purchases. 

I hope I have not come across as pro this way or con that. I think there is plenty of room in the agriculture landscape for all kinds of production methods; big or small, organic or not, etc. I just don't think we should crucify one way and praise the other to the heavens. Everything has its place.

I'm climbing off my high horse now. Feel free to kick me on the way down.

Farm Visitors

I was about to leave the house for work when a salesman arrived.  He was a non-farm salesman and moved on to the next house when I didn't buy anything. As I was bringing the cows in out of the field for their lunchtime feeding I wondered if he could see me from the road.  One of the cows had developed a limp (that we later treated) and was hobbling towards the barn.  Would he think I was mistreating that cow?  I began to imagine him shadowing me on the farm and how I might explain how and why we work the way we do.

Would I farm differently with him around?  That was the question I posed to Ryan Goodman that he wrote about in his post, How would you farm differently if..

We do get a few unexpected visitors to the farm on occasion.  I usually take them to the calf barn first to show them how we raise the smallest animals.  Then I take them in the milking parlor to watch the cows being milked.  The challenge when you have visitors is sometimes answering the questions they have.  How much milk does a cow give?  Do you use antibiotics?  How do you treat your cows?  When working on the farm day to day you sometimes forget what non-farmers actually know about what you do.  Answering their questions gives me the opportunity to think about agriculture from their perspective and makes me think about the whys of doing something that I might take for granted.

The biggest lesson learned from these visitors is in self critiquing. What should I have done to present my farm better?  How should I have answered that question?  As I watch them look around on the farm there are things that inevitably stand out that I wished didn't like an unmade bed at home when you have company.  There is always manure to be hauled off, calves to be bedded, and a sick animal that needs attention.  I can't make those things disappear for a visitor, I can only explain what happens on a farm and how I'm working to keep our animals healthy.

Perhaps the visitors who have the biggest impression on us never actually set foot on our property.  More and more people have moved into our area and drive to and from work over the road that divides our farm.  Perception can be reality to some people.  Their impression of what they see as they drive by may be all they see of farm life.  We hope the view of the cattle in good condition and the cleanliness of the road and our facilities reflect upon the well-being of the rest of the farm.

I think most farms want to do the right thing even when no one is looking.  There are many farm evaluations that can be done to assess how you are doing to prove that.  The dairy cooperative we market our milk through  has one called the DFA Gold Standard program.  It ensures their customers that the farms the milk comes from are doing a good job in animal care, milk quality, and on environmental issues.

Would I farm differently if I worked in the shadow of a stranger?  Maybe in some ways I would, but I hope the work I do on our farm is a high standard everyday.  I hope every day I work is a day I can go home proud of what I have done.