Many of my readers rightly urge me to do better than offer up a diagnosis of our problems. Show me what to do - many ask. Many also ask me to be less blunt - not to miss the point but to be more respectful of the way that we are and by being respectful invite more into the conversation.
Here is a film by Rebecca Hosking, a farmer's daughter, that is I think the model for what you are asking for. She gently but firmly shows the problem and then goes out and finds the pathway to the future. I finished the film thinking that I had indeed seen the future A future that was was going to be hard to get to because it violates many of our preconceived ideas about farming, but also a future that any of us could start to work on today, if we could overcome our mental resistance.
This is a deeply hopeful and yet also a realistic film. Rebecca uses her POV of coming from the pragmatic tradition of farming. So as a farmer's daughter she both asks the hard questions and also finds a way forward that makes practical sense. She speaks as a peer to all those that struggle to make a living farming today and she speaks as pragmatist to all who seek to find a way to the future. Shares with us her own voyage of discovery and you can see her own plans develop for her own farm. It's all about what she can do and so all about what you and I can do. The film is not a call to government action, nor is it a diatribe against the current system. It is all about what can you and I do.
It's her practical nature combined with her yearning for a better way that is such a combination.
Quiet spoken, a listener, she is also quite remarkably beautiful. There is a radiance about her that draws you in. Some of this is her art.
For before she returned to take over her father's farm, she was a naturalist and film maker. Her ability to tell a story and to select the right image and the right moment is exquisite. She never over tells. Her light hand is quite brilliant. You will "see", feel and know after this film.
She is the Planet Money of the Oil/Food issue.
If you have 50 minutes, please see this film. It may change your life.
