Eat…Think…Heal

The threads of our story began more than a decade before I was born – when man was putting his ‘stamp’ on the earth in a more cumbersome way than ever before. It permanently changed our intricate relationship with our planet. The year was 1947. It was a seemingly innocuous decision that altered man’s place on earth. That date heralded the decision to convert a war-time weapons factory in Alabama, USA into a fertiliser factory. There was a long history of development leading up to that decision and a string of consequences that have occurred as the result of it. This story is a journal, from a 21st century perspective, of man’s relationship with himself and with planet earth. The journal is through my eyes - a modern, educated woman from a western society, whose existence is woven intricately into the web of modern life. Chapter One Our farm, our family and the food we grow Fast forward 50 years after that 1947 decision, to 1997 and to the other side of the world, ‘Down Under’ on the Darling Downs in Queensland, Australia, home to some of the world’s most fertile farm land. It was also home to our farm and our family. Here you can witness modern agriculture at its supreme best. Vast tracts of land proudly show off their immaculate rows of grain crops. They are all planted using large, powerful tractors pulling precision machinery more than 10 metres wide, together worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. The planting technique is state of the art. It allows the seed to be drilled straight into the ground through last season’s left over crop stalks without disturbing the top soil to avoid the loss of precious moisture. The seeds are coated with an insecticide to stop ants from eating them and fertiliser is applied either in granular form or as a gas drilled into the soil. The plants are carefully monitored for unwanted weeds or insects during their five to six months of growth. These pests are then controlled with the required chemical at the appropriate time to give the plant its best possible growing conditions. Tracing the boundary of this immaculate, industrialised grain farm is a concession to Mother Nature. Land that could otherwise be planted to crops has been handed over to plant a green belt of trees, designed specifically to link with the trees beside the creeks, thus providing a nature path for local wildlife from one watercourse to the next. Located on the same farm is a cattle feedlot, where the cattle are fed a carefully designed ration of grain and roughage, combined with the appropriate medication, to avoid bloating or sickness, and to maximize weight gain. These cattle are fed twice a day for between three and six months before being sold to Australian customers or exported to Japan. Both aspects of this business, the crops and the feedlot, work together to buffer the variable income so familiar to those who rely on farming as their livelihood. When grain prices are high, the profit is made from the farm. At these times, the feedlot carries fewer cattle because it is too expensive to feed them. When grain prices are low, the profit is made by fattening the cattle and selling them for a higher price margin per kilogram of body weight. There can be no guarantee that the cattle market will be buoyant just because grain prices are low, but cheaper grain means one less variable to have to worry about in this highly intensive integrated farming operation. Ours was a successful business by any economic standards. It was highly valued farming land, servicing a debt of 25% of the asset base and vertically integrating its operation. It supported three generations – grandparents, parents and grandchildren. We also employed four other families on a permanent basis, plus other local people and farming contractors when the demand was there. As part of our standard practice, we reinvested profit back into the business whenever possible to help ensure its survival. It was not an overnight success. By 1997, the family business had expanded its reach over the previous 40 years, changing our farming systems from dairy farming to sheep farming to cattle and then to crops, while at the same time gradually purchasing neighbouring land when it was ready to be sold. This expansion allowed us to build our economies of scale, critical to financial survival in the world of intensive agriculture, using the high cost farming equipment across more land for better economic return. Buying more land also meant we were farming on a range of different soil types with varying water absorption capacity. This helped to reduce risk with the variable rainfall - sometimes too much rain for the heavy clay soil and sometimes too little for the light loamy soil. In addition to expanding our farming land, the cattle feedlot was established as one of Australia’s first. It’s founders, the grandfather and grandmother of our farming family, are heralded still today as pioneers in this new and exciting industry. We employed all the strategies that we could to help achieve success. Economic success was our focus … at what cost we did not yet understand. Running this sophisticated, model farming business was a family under pressure – but you wouldn’t have known it. The grandfather, who helped to pioneer the Australian cattle feedlot industry, became a leading figure in Australia in what is now the dominant method for fattening cattle across the western world. The grandmother still feels a connection with the land and ‘an eye for cattle’ recognised by all who know her. The father, my husband, is university educated and was philosophically committed to growing food to help feed the world. He had a clear vision for his family’s farming business and he was dedicated to that vision for himself and for his family. He transformed its operation to this extraordinary model of efficiency, introducing technology and land use practices that were considered by his peers and industry leaders to be leading edge and world class.