Following Farmers Weekly’s recent special report on rural leadership in the sector, the publication’s managing editor, Bryan Gibson, was invited to speak to former dairy farmer and radio veteran Andy Thompson’s The Rural Roundup podcast. Thompson was keen to hear about the journey of producing the special report and why Farmers Weekly thought it was such an important topic to cover.
Listen to the podcast which aired on Sunday, or read the transcript below.
Andy Thompson (AT): Alrighty, welcome back to the show. Now, I do want your feedback on this next discussion. I’m going to talk to Bryan Gibson, who is the managing editor of the Farmers Weekly. Bryan, G’day, welcome to the show.
Bryan Gibson (BG) : G’day, how’s it going?
AT: Very good. Hey, I love the Farmers Weekly. Always have. And I’m not just blowing smoke. I’ve always said, right from when I was farming, it was my favourite farming publication. Last week, though, you guys did something really interesting. You did a special report on leadership in the Ag sector. Now, I know there’s been a lot of discussion about leadership, but I’m interested in why you guys at Farmers Weekly thought that it was so important that you needed to run a whole report on it. What was the thinking behind it?
BG: Well, I think we just had our eyes on what had been playing out in the sector over the last couple of years and we’ve got ourselves in a place where there’s a lot of farmers and people in the industry, seemingly frustrated about the job that sector leaders are doing and also frustrated with the government for their regulatory regime that they feel might be imposing a bit much on the sector. And there was obviously a bit of a disconnect there between the membership or levy payers in the industry and those who are tasked with advocating for their views with the government. So, we thought we’d kind of step back and take a look at the issue of leadership as a whole, pathways to leadership in the sector – are they robust? Then talk to some of the people who are in those leadership positions right now and quiz them about the challenges they are facing, and just take a look at it really.
AT: Yeah. Fascinating report. What did you personally learn while you were preparing the report? What was your takeaway?
BG: I think the most interesting thing came from Professor Hamish Gow from Lincoln University. He kind of put forward a strategy that starts again on the way we go about solving big issues like climate change or, you know, environmental improvements, that sort of thing. I mean, at the moment the government decides it wants to do something, writes some legislation and that goes out for consultation and stakeholders have a chance to say their piece or write their piece and give some feedback. And then it goes through that process, and it becomes law. He’s advocating for a sort of a citizens forum, or a special forum set up where you identify the key stakeholders at the very beginning and bring them together to discuss opinion, research, policy ideas and sort of have a ground up approach to it, I guess. So, I thought that was really interesting.
AT: That sort of strikes at the heart of our parliamentary democracy system, if he’s talking about that, so that strikes me as the way the TOP party kind of think, that’s quite interesting. One of the things that you wrote in your editorial about this, where you discussed leadership in the sector and you said, at the moment, many of the loudest voices that challenge our current leadership seem to think that compromising is out of the question, they want lines in the sand, they want to be listened to, but they don’t want to listen themselves. I guess the question here is, do people not understand what leadership is about? I guess. Or do we now have a different idea of what leadership is?
BG: I think so. I mean, leadership is about compromise in a lot of ways. If you go into any sort of discussion without the ability to listen to what’s being said by the other side and you put that line in the sand and you won’t move from it, then it’s very difficult to get any kind of consensus or solution, I think.
AT: Yeah, I think it’s a little bit like that disconnect, I see it sometimes when it comes to consultation and when we’re talking about the consultation process for HWEN on the show. And I always say that with consultation, everyone feels that they’ve been consulted with if they get the outcome they want. If they don’t get the outcome that they want, they don’t feel they’ve been consulted with.
BG: Yeah, it’s true. And of course, that comes back to communication. So, any leadership group needs to communicate what’s happening at the top with their stakeholders to ensure that they are fully informed about what’s going on. And even if there is things that are not incredibly well received, at least everyone’s part of the process, and that can only be a good thing.
AT: There was a whole series of discussions or interviews with sector leaders. What’s your take on the level of leadership or the quality of our leadership in the ag sector in New Zealand?
BG: Look, I think it’s very good on the whole. I think it’s got to be one of the toughest jobs going at the moment. Putting forward the views of a vast and disparate sector, sitting down around a table with policymakers and trying to thrash out policy that will work. The thing is, our sector was given such a great opportunity with the emissions pricing to come up with our own plan for it. And on the whole, the process, you know, is working okay, but it just turned into a big fight.
AT: I do blame the Government for that. They had an opportunity to rubber stamp it, bank it and move on, and they couldn’t help themselves. I’m not even going to say Tinker, they had to come back with a radical change. Just on just on leadership, though, Brian, is one of the problems that some of our most influential leaders are there due to appointments by a levy organisation that farmers feel that they don’t really have a real say in whether they contribute or not. I mean, we’ve got Federated Farmers, which is a subscription-based model of leadership. We’ve got groundswell, which I’m going to say is self-appointed and that maybe a bit cruel, but I think it is. But is it the fact that some of the leaders that are representing the ag sector are there because of rules like a levy?
BG: I guess the thing to remember is that the levy bodies do much more than advocacy and lobbying. They conduct research, they do a lot of industry good stuff as well. So, speaking for the rural sector, to the rest of New Zealand is just part of their job. I guess that’s one thing. But, you know, every six years, the levy payers have the ability to put a view forward about how they think the body is going and there’s obviously opportunities to join and be part of the decision-making process at lower and mid-levels in those organisations. So, I’m not sure if there’s another way.
AT: Yeah, and hence why you’ve done the special report, which I found fascinating, the fact that you canvassed all the views. There was some quite interesting discussions in there, and also the fact that leadership is such a big issue in the sector at the moment.
AT: Bryan Gibson, managing editor of Farmers Weekly. Great to have you on the show. I just implore everyone, if you can’t find it on the coffee table, go online, look at the virtual publication, Farmers Weekly, there is some really great views in there. And just quickly, what has the feedback being like from it? What have the readers said?
BG: Yeah, we’ve had positive feedback on the series. I think I never set out to solve current issues, but it was just to get people thinking about going forward and the very fast paced and changing world we live in. What is the best structure to help us negotiate it. And so, yeah, I think the feedback I’ve got has been really positive, which is good.
AT: Driving discussion is always a good thing, isn’t it? And having people discussing the issue instead of talking past each other, talking about an issue, is positive. So, I applaud you guys on doing that. I think it’s fantastic. Hey, look out of time, but really appreciate your time. Bryan, I’d love to talk to you again.
BG: Excellent. Thanks for having me. All right.
AT: Bryan Gibson, managing editor of the Farmers Weekly. Go on, have a look at it and go find it on the coffee table.