What does the average Aussie think of Australian dairy farming? Apparently, not much. They’re happy that their milk and other dairy foods are exceptionally safe and high quality and that’s about it. They know they are blissfully ignorant and most are happy to keep it that way.
This was the message from Neilson’s Courtney Sullivan when she addressed the Australian Dairy Conference last week. She’d selected some drawings made by milk drinkers to give us an insight into their thinking. A cow with eight teats and two udders produced milk that somehow got to a factory, then a warehouse, then into a massive shopping trolley that finished up in a massive house.
So, why are you here reading a dairy farmer’s blog, dear reader? You are obviously an exception from the norm and I’m very pleased that you are so far from average (still, it is very rare to meet an average Australian, who shares a home with 1.6 others and one-third of a dog).
Apparently, the Australian Year of the Farmer believes that the average Canberran family gets excited about loyalty cards when they think of farmers. Victoria Taylor took her family to the Canberra Show last weekend and you’d be amazed to read her blog post about the experience and the lasting impression made by the Australian Year of the Farmer stand.
Love to hear your thoughts on what makes farming interesting to those not currently up to their boots in it!
The Milk Maid Marian 
Although city born and bred, all my fathers cousins and uncles were wheat farmers in the Mallee and Wimmera, and Most of mums relatives did sheep and wheat around Echuca and Moama. So I suppose I was really meant to be farm bred, just missed the link.
As a country that was developed on the farmers back it is unfortunate that now 95% of the population wouldn’t have a clue about primary production.
One suggestion would be to get shows like Landline on a mainstream viewing time. It is a great showcase for primary producers, just unfortunate to be a time when most of the population is not watching tv, Or if they are, it is Footy and sports time.
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Here Here David. More shows like Landline, will hopefully educate the country on primary producers, and the hard slog they do, to produce the product that feeds our families.
More programs such as Farm Day would be awesome as well, giving city slickers a chance to experience the day in the life of a farmer. I think more primary producers need to get on board to help educate our communities more and more on what it is we do 7days a week 365 days a year, missing holidays, birthdays and sometimes even Christmas to keep food on our supermarket shelves.
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As we are curently in the process of packing up the family to head back to the country to milk the moo’s as my 6yo daughter refers to it. I got chatting to my 10yo nephew, who’s curiosity about farming got the better of him. As he was pouring himself a glass of milk for his much loved night time milo, he questioned me about how much money we will make milking cows. He was curious to know whether we get paid the same amount as what they pay for their milk at the supermarket. Without confusing him too much, I explained that the big milk factories supply cartons of milk to the supermarkets and only a small amount of the price in which he buys his supermarket milk at goes back to the farmers. He wisely replied, thats not much money then (they like most struggling aussie, purchase the $1 p/ltr milk). He then assumed because we were going to be farmers, he could get free eggs. I had to explain that we were not going to be farming chooks :-). And that there are many different types of farmers. But the conversation got me thinking. Children in our Metropolitan/regional areas really need to be taught better on where there day to day foods are coming from. We are lucky that our children have experienced both country and regional lifestyles, and they are the first to tell their regional/metropolitan friends where milk comes from, and how we look after calves etc. But there is not enough education for our children to understand farming and appreciate the foods they buy everyday. I cant wait to get back on farm and have my nieces and nephews and new regional friends come and visit us on farm so they to can experience the amazing lifestyle farming has to offer.
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