I start this article by making it very clear that I know absolutely nothing about public relations!
It strikes me that as farmers we do so much for Britain, on a very basic level we grow and produce the best food in the world, care for animals at an amazingly high level, sculpt the countryside into the wonderful place that it is and even pull over on our tractor sometimes to let people go by!
Of course we don’t communicate any of this very well, we are shy retiring types in the main who like to hide our light under a bushel if at all possible unless of course we are bragging about something down the pub. So this week my brain was slightly fried by a query from a local resident. I will try and paint the picture for you and you can all think of the public relations advice you might give to help my business.
I received a Whats App from a local resident who lives near one of my pear orchards, his complaint was that ever since I had planted the area around my orchards with beautiful wild flowers he and his neighbours had been infested with bugs and insects entering their houses and causing all sorts of problems. So as a farmer I have tried to increase the biodiversity by spending extra money on establishing wild flowers to help bees, pollination and the environment in general, I look upon this as a success story. This has now caused a problem and the person in question is wanting to know if have I changed my insecticide usage and what I am going to do to remedy the situation.
I am sure someone brighter than I could come up with some better PR advice but this looks like a damned if I do and a damned if I don’t situation to me. Answers on a postcard please.