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Farm And Rural Advocates Find New Terms Of Engagement
SARA WYANT
WASHINGTON, D.C.
For decades, anyone who wanted to be involved as an advocate for farm and rural issues had to make big sacrifices, including: traveling to distant locations, spending countless hours in meetings and finding someone to keep an eye on the farm and family while you were gone.
Not any longer. The Internet, cell phone technology and new software programs have revolutionized the way advocates work.
But even though technological changes have made important differences in the way individuals and organizations can advocate, it also requires some creative, more “entrepreneurial” thinking at the top.
Julie Anna Potts, Executive Vice President of the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF), said her board decided about seven years ago that they have to do more to reach out to younger members in non-traditional ways or they were going to fall behind.
“We were challenged to get more members engaged to be advocates for our industry,” she told Agri-Pulse. “It’s been a very deliberate effort that requires a different manner of thinking.”
Potts says AFBF has made several internal changes, including coordinating issues management across several departments and ramping up their communications and outreach efforts. But they’ve also focused on other new opportunities.
For example, they discussed “micro-volunteering” where an individual perhaps can’t commit to the time demands required by becoming an elected officer but can get involved for an hour or two at a time by writing letters or participating in a virtual meeting.
One of the outcomes of AFBF’s effort to grow engagement was the creation of the “Grassroots Outreach” or “GO Team” earlier this year.
Currently there are 118 GO Team members in 42 states, explains Cody Lyon, AFBF Director for Grassroots and Political Advocacy. He describes them as a "tip of the spear" elite advocacy group.
“We ask the GO Team to do more than basic advocacy and be more involved in social media,” Lyon says. “This includes building relationships with lawmakers, publishing op-eds and blogs, interacting with media and other high-level advocacy tactics to advance Farm Bureau policy. We’ve asked them to provide personal, real-world examples on the most pertinent issues facing agriculture and connect to lawmakers and their staffs.”
One of the most recent examples is the “Ditch the Rule” campaign, where AFBF members have been using social media, appeared on national media and even produced a popular video in an effort to convince the Environmental Protection Agency to repeal their proposed rule defining waters of the United States.
Potts says the GO Team provides an opportunity for their members to demonstrate their commitment to the industry and talk about what they do.
“It’s that authentic voice that works in Congress and with the public,” she emphasizes.
Social media plays a role
Younger advocates seem to be especially energized and eager to help tell their message and influence policymakers.
We recently profiled 50 young advocates under 50 years old and, among many other things, asked them to share the tactics and tools they’ll use to get their message across to the people in power going forward – and to the public that places them there.
The young leaders said packing a political punch with lawmakers has four important facets – learning about candidates; voting; building relationships with legislators, their aides and government officials; and communicating to those in power about agriculture and its needs.
Stacie Euken, who raises crops and livestock in Iowa, says farmers need to know their candidates, know what they stand for and know what their political party’s objectives are.
“If you don’t vote, you can’t complain,” Nebraska cattle farmer Anne Burkholder says.
“Our decision makers are further and further removed from their agricultural roots,” says first-generation Kentucky farmer Ryan Bivens – one reason he and others believe it’s ever so important to build relationships and have conversations with lawmakers.
Besides the communications training many of these individuals gained through FFA, Farm Bureau, their commodity groups and agricultural leadership programs, some had communication or marketing experience through internships or jobs they held before returning to the farm. Many of them draw upon that training and experience in expressing their power and influence.
Communicate they do – through one-on-one visits with lawmakers at home and in the nation’s capital, and with consumers, using social media, educational programs and more.
Young leaders still understand the importance of telling agriculture’s story to reporters, and Missouri hog farmer Chris Chinn reminds farmers that a letter to the editor can still have power.
“If you get a captive audience, you need to make farmers their friend,” says Ben Boyd, who grows cotton and other crops and livestock in Georgia.
As for tools and tactics to influence policy in the face of changing rural demographics, Chinn says farmers need to continue to use social media.
“Social media has given us a whole new definition of ‘friends’,” Bivens says. And, those friends are increasingly important.
Chinn says that “even if it’s one conversation at a time, people need to share.”
Zach Hunnicutt of Nebraska talked about how social media and mobile technology help spread agriculture’s message. “I can do more with a smart phone than I could have 10 or 15 years ago,” Hunnicutt says.“I can have a grassroots voice.”
“I reach so many people through social media,” Kansas farmer Stacey Forshee says, “because somebody I reached has shared.”
Going forward, Chinn is hoping that next generation in agriculture will be even better communicators at a younger age. She thinks they may have more and better conversations because they have quickly adopted technology and social media and they’re “not afraid to put themselves ‘out there.’”
Editor’s note: Agri-Pulse Editorial Coordinator Ann Mueller contributed to this piece. ∆
SARA WYANT: Editor of Agri-Pulse, a weekly e-newsletter covering farm and rural policy. To contact her, go to: http://www.agri-pulse.com/
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