John Ikerd’s Thoughts on The New American Farm
Though nothing can match the power of Ikerd’s delivery, we intended to reprint
his rousing keynote in its entirety. Alas, space constraints restrict us to this
abstract, written by Ikerd himself. For the complete
transcript of Ikerd’s speech at the PFI Annual Meeting, contact Nan at the
office or check out the PFI web site. In addition, John Ikerd has his own web
site, http://hometown.aol.com/jeikerd,
on which he recently placed eleven new papers.
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As keynote speaker, Dr. John Ikerd brought a
powerful voice and
message to the podium . |
“American Agriculture as we have known it is coming to an end. In fact, there
will be no future in farming unless we have the courage to challenge
conventional wisdom based on the economics of short-run, self-interests.
However, once we realize that economics is nothing more than a belief system,
that it is not based on fundamental truths, we can begin to change the
conceptual foundation for the future of agriculture and for society as a whole.
We have no obligation to accept the market as God. A new post-industrial model
for American Agriculture is arising under the conceptual umbrella of
sustainability that is based on a higher concept of self interests – a concept
that recognizes personal, interpersonal, and spiritual values as but different
levels of self-interests, and thus, as equally important dimensions of quality
of life. The New American Farm is being developed under many names and takes on
many forms, but some fundamental principles of this new paradigm for farming are
beginning to emerge.”
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