The Rural Voice, 1983-12, Page 42KEITH ROULSTON
Can't afford
today's standards
by Keith Roulston
We are, despite recent setbacks,
living in one of the richest
civilizations the world has ever
known. The thing that has always
amazed me, however, is that despite
our wealth there are so many things
we "can't afford" to do today that
our poorer ancestors took for
granted.
People can afford to take trips to
Florida and Europe which only 20
years ago seemed to be exotic places.
We can put computers in our homes,
not for productive use, but simply as
toys to amuse ourselves. Yet, while
my turn-of-the—century farm house
has baseboards of solid oak that are
15 inches high, modern expensive
houses (even those expensive condo-
miniums in the city) have baseboards
so small you could wonder if they are
there at all. Hardly anyone can
"afford" a solid hardwood dining -
room table of the kind grandma took
for granted 50 years ago.
Many things are similar at the
production end. There's a growing
concern, for instance, on the part of
many urban people, about the
treatment of animals in food
production. People don't like the idea
of chickens spending all their lives in
wire cages in order to mechanize the
egg -production system. They don't
like the idea of thousands of pigs
being crowded into little pens in big
barns to turn the production of pork
into a factory operation. They don't
like cattle being kept in concrete
feedlots instead of out wandering
through green pastures.
The problem is, they can't have
their bacon and eggs and eat them
too. On the one hand, urban critics
claim farmers aren't efficient. On the
other, they are unwilling to pay
farmers enough money for their
goods to allow them to adopt alter-
natives to the high-volume manage-
ment practices the urbanites deplore.
Any farmer who doesn't like the idea
of hens in cages or pork and beef
factories had better quit because the
economics of the situation are soon
going to drive him out anyway.
Likewise the old mixed farm was
probably the best way to make use of
all the resources on a farm. Because
he didn't have to work on high
volume, a farmer could use land for
the purposes for which it was best
suited. With the need to grow large
volumes of cash crops today, farmers
are often tempted to plant high-
income crops on fields which would
better be used for pasture or some
other low-income crop.
In the old days a farmer took a
little of his income from this, a little
from that, some from his cattle, a bit
from sheep, pigs and chickens, some
from wheat and barley and a little,
for instance, from his bush. In
winter, when there wasn't field work
to be done, he'd spend his spare
hours in the bush, cutting what
mature trees were ready to be cut,
selling logs to local saw mills, keeping
smaller wood to burn as fuel. The
farmer had cheap fuel and a cash
income while a local saw mill
provided jobs. It was efficient use of
land. But we consider efficiency a
new way today and the farmer can't
afford to work that way.
Neither, apparently, can the saw
mills. Big lumber companies today
say that the only efficient way in
forestry is to harvest whole areas of
bush like a farmer harvests corn,
leaving nothing of use behind. Except
that, while a farmer can plow down
his stubble and have another crop
growing six months later, the forestry
industry needs 40 years to grow a new
crop, if they get around to replanting
at all. The old way of forestry, taking
only mature trees, letting the trees
reseed themselves was efficient, but
not by today's standards.
Pity our advanced society, so rich it
can't afford common sense.0
Keith Roulston has been writing this
column since 1977 and is the
originator and former publisher of
The Rural Voice. He has written
several successful plays and is con-
nected with the Blyth Summer
Festival. He lives with his family near
Blyth.
All grades of nuts & bolts
Westward Tools
Keto Abrasives
Epps Pressure Washers
Scott's Industrial
& Farm Supplies
R.R. 4, Tara
519-376-0283
8 miles west of Owen Sound
off Highway 21
Season's
Greetings
sincere thanks
for your
continued patronage
Mixmatic Products, manufactured by:
TWIN ROLL INC.
Head Office - Gorrie, Ont.
519-335-3585
THE RURAL VOICE,
DECEMBER 1983 PG. 41