Introducing Ag Is For People
Make some space in your inbox for a (more) humanist view of agtech
Welcome to Agriculture is for People, brought to you by Farmhand Ventures.
We’re going to explore agrifood technology in a human-centric lens, because, after all, agriculture, for all of its ~10,000 year history, has been about ensuring that people have enough resources. Unfortunately, it’s only occasionally been about ensuring that all people have access to resources and has all too often been at the expense of many of the people enabling the system to function. Let’s be better.
I’m aiming for a biweekly (once every 2 weeks - you don’t want 2 emails/week from me and I sure as heck don’t want to write them) cadence. I won’t let any newsletter go on longer than 5 minute-read time. I’ll include some of the stuff that we’ve read/listened to that’s relevant and worth reading. I also promise not to be (too) boring or (too) buzzy. Oh, and it’ll be free.
This week, I’m going to dive right in with a potentially hot take:
People and their short term needs should take a higher priority than “The Climate” and its needs.
Don’t get me wrong - I am very concerned about climate change mitigation and adaptation - that’s what drew me to ag in the first place. Environmental issues will continue to most severely impact the most vulnerable people in society, and climate change is already making it worse. I’m worried about biodiversity and the fragility of ecosystems; I care deeply about improving animal welfare and improving production practices.
I’m deeply committed to working to combat climate change. AND, I don’t want to inadvertently harm people in my attempt to “save the world.”
I don’t want “happier” chickens when it means that a single mom down the street from me in St. Louis can no longer afford a dozen eggs for her kids. I don’t want organic berries that only the wealthy can afford when it means that the seasonal workers in fields are going to be doing more excruciatingly difficult work for wages that are barely livable. I certainly don’t want cheap organic berries that mean workers are going to do more work for even lower wages.
Everything has side-effects, and it’s really important for those of us in agtech-land to try to think about those side-effects before we accidentally create bigger problems than we’ve “solved.” To be clear - I do want happy chickens and healthier soils and more delicious strawberries. I just think that it’s very important to weigh the benefits and the side-effects of “better” agrifood practices from a human-first perspective, including the people in the fields and in the factories and the WIC/SNAP budgeting wizards (heavy overlap there in SNAP users and agrifood workers) trying to give their families nutritious meals.
At Farmhand Ventures, we believe that ag is for people, and that if we’re not listening to and thinking about the people in the system, we’re doing it wrong. Lot’s more to come, both in this newsletter and beyond.
Over the past week(+), I read some things that made me think:
😡 Cannabis & undocumented immigrants - This is more important to be aware of than any thought piece on the newest tech. People are being exploited, and it’s not right.
“Workers are leaving strawberries; they’re leaving lettuce; they’re leaving their traditional jobs to go work in cannabis, because it pays cash and it tends to be easier to work,” Padilla said. “You’re standing up; you’re indoors” in some cases.
Everyone who eats strawberries and lettuce (and produce, generally) should be concerned that people are desperate enough to take these risks for $15/day in cash. As someone who has spent countless hours personally roguing, harvesting, bucking (take the leaves+bud off the stem, really fun verb choice by the cannabis industry) and drying hemp for cannabinoid extraction, trust me when I tell you that this is not easy work. Back in 2019, it was the norm to pay everyone on the hemp crews $14-18/hour. And it wasn’t really enough then, but it was what was acceptable.
🍽️ Feeding the World? We Aren't Even Feeding Ourselves: US Ag Imports Reach Record High - This piece from the FarmAction team raises an important point about the risks of not diversifying domestic agricultural production.
“If 270,000 acres of Midwest farmland (about the size of a county) were transitioned from corn-soy rotations to vegetable production, $882.4 million in farm-level sales would be worth about $3.3 billion when sold at retail.”
And what’s the biggest bottleneck to cropland diversification? Labor.
🤖 Crop Robotics 2022: Beyond the Valley of Death - Mixing Bowl Hub & Better Food Ventures have pulled together yet another awesome market report, this time on our absolute favorite topic - robots! Their insights are thoughtful and informed, and the map would make a great addition to any office wall. 🤓
🚜 How John Deere Plans to build a world of fully autonomous farming by 2030 < Nice round up by Bob Woods at CNBC of what the big guys (JD, AgCo and CHS) are doing around autonomy (and related stuff.)
Travel is back! Find me* at:
*I’ll be the one on crutches…on the mend from a 🏉 injury leading to a necessary hardware upgrade in my ankle🦿 [we did win the game and tourney, so, worth it?]
Regen Food Systems Investment Forum, Denver, CO, Oct 12-13 - Koen is going to attempt to wrangle Ashlie, Paul and me into an interactive (but timed) ideation session on the 13th at 2:20pm MST
FIRA, Fresno, CA, Oct 18-20 - Rob, Charlie, Isaac, Anna, John and I are going to unpack and build upon the Mixing Bowl Hub’s Crop Robotics 2022 report on Tue the 18th from 1:30-2:30pm PST.
IFPA’s Global Produce & Floral Show, Orlando, FL, Oct 26-29