According to one rural sociologist, when food becomes cool, people's attitude toward how it gets to their plates runs cold.

by Geoffrey Habron

When Jeff Sharp surveyed rural Ohio residents about issues that affect them, he found that the number of people concerned about animal agriculture grew from 29 percent in 2004 to 40 percent just two years later. And though the topic rates much lower than other concerns, including obesity, mad cow disease and the loss of jobs due to globalization, it’s still a growing issue.

Sharp, an associate professor of rural sociology at The Ohio State University attributes part of the growing concern to the rising interest of consumers in the food system as evidenced by the recent bestselling books Animal, Vegetable, Mineral: A Year of Food Life by Barbara Kingsolver and Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals.

"I think agriculture and the food system are kind of becoming cool in popular culture," Sharp said. "More people may be talking about the food system, and the information they are receiving is from people with and without an agriculture background."

There is a growing social distance between agriculture and the public in Ohio as fewer and fewer people have firsthand experience with modern agriculture. Schoolchildren no longer spend their summers on grandma and grandpa’s farm. And Sharp feels the Ohio results likely parallel the views of Michigan residents.

Here’s what he found:

• 88 percent of Ohioans believe that agriculture contributes to a strong quality of life.
• Of those Ohioans who self-reported having knowledge about livestock agriculture, 59 percent believe animal agriculture threatens rural quality of life, and 57 percent say it requires greater regulation.
• 63 percent of all Ohioans agreed with the statement that they trust farmers to protect the environment.

"While 63 percent is a large proportion, the fact is that quite a few Ohioans don’t agree with that [last] statement," Sharp said. "That's something we need to be pretty sensitive about. The absence of trust could be the source of some of our tensions out there."

Sharp identified an opportunity to bridge the gap between animal agriculture and the public. Though a majority of the Ohio public expressed concerns about animal agriculture, 60 percent agreed that large-scale animal agriculture contributes positively to the economy. So despite potential concerns about the quality of life impacts, many appreciate the economic benefits.

Because both farmers and the public care about the food system, there may be an opportunity to find common ground through increased interaction and dialogue. One way to look at it is that farmers need to cultivate relationships with the surrounding community, not just cultivate the land. Sharp identified neighboring as one way to increase interactions with the surrounding public to build support. Neighboring requires farmers to interact more directly and positively with their local community.

"Collaborating with other community organizations, such as chambers of commerce, might help the agricultural community increase interactions with the non-farming public and better communicate their needs and interests," he said. "More connections may build more social capital in the form of trust, understanding and resources necessary to prevent or effectively resolve conflict."

The need for farmers to actively network to become better known and integrated into their communities may require a shift in thinking for those in agriculture, but it's a shift that is required given the growing social distance between agriculture and nonagriculture sectors, which increases with every generation. The growing interest of consumers in the food system perhaps provides the opportunity for dialogue about how to develop a food system that ensures a high quality of life for nonfarmers and a livelihood for farmers.