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Speaker 1: Now here's a highlight from Coast to Coast AM on iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Man, Welcome back to Coast to Coast George Nori with you.

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Speaker 2: Joel Salatin with us and his family owned Polyface Farm

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Speaker 2: in Virginia Shenandoa Valley. They produce and direct marketing salad,

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Speaker 2: bar beef, pigorater pork, pasteurized poultry, and pastured eggs. Author

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Speaker 2: of a number of books, he speaks at food, farming

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Speaker 2: and health conferences all over the planet. Polyface Farm is

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Speaker 2: the good farm featured in the award winning documentary Food Inc.

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Speaker 2: Features prominently in the ecological alternative in the New York

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Speaker 2: Times bestseller Omnivore's Dilemma. His self described moniker is listen

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Speaker 2: to this Christian, libertarian, environmentalist, capitalist, lunatic farmer, Joel, welcome back.

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Speaker 2: Have you been.

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Speaker 3: I've been great, George, thank you. It's a delight in

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Speaker 3: an honor to be with you.

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Speaker 2: What's going on? Why are the European farmers so upset?

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Speaker 3: Yeah? Well, you know, I've been to Europe many, many

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Speaker 3: times over the years, doing a lot of you know,

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Speaker 3: I do farmer seminars over there on how to farm

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Speaker 3: without chemicals and direct market and the different things that

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Speaker 3: we do. And the reason that this is so I

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Speaker 3: have a little different take on it because I've spent

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Speaker 3: so much time there with farmers. In fact, I'm going

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Speaker 3: back to Austria and Hungary here in May and then

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Speaker 3: back to Switzerland and maybe Portugal in October. So so

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Speaker 3: I've had a thing a little bit of a different

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Speaker 3: perspective than a lot of folks. And the thing that

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Speaker 3: people have to understand is that the EU has subsidized

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Speaker 3: farmers to the tune of sixty billion dollars that's six

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Speaker 3: zero sixty billion dollars a year basically since World War two.

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Speaker 3: And so these farmers have gotten extremely whatever you know,

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Speaker 3: dependent on this government large s and they've overbuilt buildings,

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Speaker 3: they've overbought machinery, they've overspent because that's what you do,

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Speaker 3: you know, when there's easy money. And and so, for example,

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Speaker 3: in the Netherlands. One of the reasons that it all

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Speaker 3: started in the Netherlands is because the Netherlands is the

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Speaker 3: is the point of the sphere in this old this

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Speaker 3: whole movement. For example, yeah, I ran into It's not

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Speaker 3: uncommon there to run into a dairy farmer for example, Hey,

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Speaker 3: you know, yeah, we're dairy farming. How many how many

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Speaker 3: cows your milk? No, we look a hundred, okay, so

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Speaker 3: how big is your farm? Ten acres, George. You can't

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Speaker 3: put one hundred cows on ten acres and assimilate. I mean,

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Speaker 3: that's two hundred and twenty thousand pounds of manure and

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Speaker 3: urine per acre, which is about four times the amount

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Speaker 3: that the land can handle. And so in the Netherlands,

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Speaker 3: for example, all this manure and you'urine runoff. Same thing

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Speaker 3: with pigs chickens, but but dairy cows are about are

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Speaker 3: probably the worst. It runs into the canals and clogs

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Speaker 3: up the canals with with nutrients that make the willows

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Speaker 3: and the and the vegetation grow voraciously. Well, then the

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Speaker 3: township has all this money trying to clean out the

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Speaker 3: canals so the water can run. The countryside smells like

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Speaker 3: a toilet. I've been there. I mean the whole thing,

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Speaker 3: not in the cities, but in the country. The whole

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Speaker 3: area smells like a like a toilet because of this

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Speaker 3: over you know, over waste, and so you can't you

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Speaker 3: simply can't overrun an ecology like that. So that's why

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Speaker 3: things started in the in the Netherlands, and it has spread,

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Speaker 3: you know, to other areas and so and and just

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Speaker 3: like here in the US. The average farmer there is

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Speaker 3: fairly old, you know, they're about sixty years old. And

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Speaker 3: the older you get, as you know, the less the

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Speaker 3: less adaptable you are, you know, to to transitions. And

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Speaker 3: so with the EU under pressure now with all their

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Speaker 3: social programs and now we try to send military aid

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Speaker 3: to the Ukraine with Putin invasion and trying to come

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Speaker 3: up to their NATO spending budgets, they're looking for work

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Speaker 3: and you know, where can we where can we cut spending?

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Speaker 3: And agriculture is certainly you know, top on the list.

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Speaker 3: And so as they start to try to wean these

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Speaker 3: farmers some of them off off of these you gotta

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Speaker 3: russe the EU farmers fit half half of their income.

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Speaker 3: The average EU farmer half of his annual income comes

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Speaker 3: from direct EU subsidies, half of his income. So when

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Speaker 3: they start taking away this perk or that perk or

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Speaker 3: something else, these older farmers are are fighting back. You know,

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Speaker 3: they don't they don't like to be weaned off that

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Speaker 3: government paycheck. And and and this is what's you know,

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Speaker 3: this is what's broadly developing it.

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Speaker 2: Is it fixable over there?

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Speaker 3: Jewel, Well, yes, it certainly is fixable. The the farmers, though,

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Speaker 3: need to understand that they simply can't be just dependent

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Speaker 3: on a government paycheck all the time. I mean, you know,

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Speaker 3: I had I had, I've had farmers show me like

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Speaker 3: the all the the spreadsheet, the checklist, and so I'm

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Speaker 3: driving along, you know, and the farmer says, see that,

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Speaker 3: see that that goose nest over there is a wild

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Speaker 3: goose nest. I get one thousand dollars a year, uh

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Speaker 3: for not disturbing that nest. Uh. And it's amazing all

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Speaker 3: the different things these quote unquote ecological benefits that farmers

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Speaker 3: get a direct check for over there. And so so yes, uh,

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Speaker 3: it's certainly they don't need they don't need chemical fertilizer.

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Speaker 3: They can use Compostuh. No place has as much biomass

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Speaker 3: and compostable material as Europe. They can direct market, they

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Speaker 3: don't have to, you know, they don't have to go

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Speaker 3: through all the channels, you know, supermarkets and things like that,

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Speaker 3: and and a lot of it is just they need

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Speaker 3: to start acting or being adapting more to an entrepreneurial

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Speaker 3: business climate and those kinds of transitions are They're difficult,

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Speaker 3: especially when you're older. So yes, it's fixable, but it

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Speaker 3: will it will take some time to move their their

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Speaker 3: agricultural economy and subsidization program, you know, to move it

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Speaker 3: to a more market area oriented, market oriented program, like

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Speaker 3: you know, like we have here.

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Speaker 2: Now, somebody listening in tonight Joel might saying, who cares

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Speaker 2: about European farmers? What about here? How do you answer that?

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Speaker 3: Yeah? Well, of course, you know, historically kind of as

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Speaker 3: Europe goes, so goes America, you know, about three three

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Speaker 3: decades later, and uh, you know, I don't know in

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Speaker 3: this case whether that's going to be the way things go.

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Speaker 3: But but what what's turned? What what has happened? I

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Speaker 3: think in this is a much broader what I call

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Speaker 3: a blue collar revolution. And one of the reasons that

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Speaker 3: the farmers are joining are enjoying so much support. I mean,

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Speaker 3: it's easy for me, kind of as a libertarian entrepreneur,

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Speaker 3: to say, come on, farmers, you know, get over this.

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Speaker 3: You got to adapt. Let let's let's join the real

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Speaker 3: market here. Yeah, it's kind of easy to say that.

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Speaker 3: But but more broadly, I think the farmers appreciate that.

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Speaker 3: Being a minority. They have become the whipping boy, the

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Speaker 3: whipping boy for the uh, the for the economic malaise

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Speaker 3: that is now fostered upon Europe due to escalating prices

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Speaker 3: of social programs, all the social safety network. And now

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Speaker 3: what's really you know, put the you know, put the

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Speaker 3: hyaenus on it. All is this whole the war in Ukraine.

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Speaker 3: That's that's and and of course the price of fuel,

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Speaker 3: you know, like Germany where they're not they're not getting

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Speaker 3: that cheap Russian UH fuel, So the fuel prices have doubled,

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Speaker 3: and of course the prices for fuel for the farmers

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Speaker 3: have also doubled. And so that's why this this whole

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Speaker 3: not getting a fuel allowance has got them so stirred up.

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Speaker 3: Not only are they trying to cut the fuel allowance,

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Speaker 3: the subsidy for the farmers, but I'll also the the

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Speaker 3: price of the fuel is going up. And so uh

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Speaker 3: there's this broad kind of support and I totally get

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Speaker 3: this that farmers have become the whipping boy for the

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Speaker 3: economic uh restriction, the economic difficulties that all this is creating.

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Speaker 3: And that's why it's it's enjoying such broad support among

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Speaker 3: you know, the trades, the electricians, the plumbers, the truckers,

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Speaker 3: the blue collar trades see this as as generally a

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Speaker 3: disrespect and a dishonor of the working class. And I

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Speaker 3: think that's that's what can move across to America. Here

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Speaker 3: is is is a is a broad uh backlash among

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Speaker 3: the trade blue collar movements for the same kinds of issue,

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Speaker 3: you know, cheap imports, over regulation, difficulty to start a business,

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Speaker 3: high taxes, those kinds of things are are enjoying the

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Speaker 3: similar kind of support here in the US.

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Speaker 2: Now, we of course have been our farmers the bread

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Speaker 2: basket of the world in producing food for everybody. Is

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Speaker 2: that going to continue, Joel?

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Speaker 3: Yes, I don't see any any reason that that will

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Speaker 3: that will discontinue. American farmers have. I mean we we

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Speaker 3: do offer subsidies, well they don't call it subsidies anywhere,

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Speaker 3: they call it crop crop insurance. But we only ensure

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Speaker 3: six things we don't ensure. We don't ensure beef, cows

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Speaker 3: and and maple syrup and honey. Uh. You know, we

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Speaker 3: we only ensure six six commodities that we're always part

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Speaker 3: of the subject the uh corn, soybeans, wheat, rice, cotton,

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Speaker 3: and sugarcane, that's it. Yeah, just those six those are

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Speaker 3: the things now, you know, there there have been excuse me,

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Speaker 3: things like price supports for things like milk, you know,

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Speaker 3: dairy things like that that have definitely, ah created weirdness

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Speaker 3: within the within the market. Anytime, anytime the government intervenes

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Speaker 3: in the marketplace, there's going to be distortions that you

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Speaker 3: wouldn't see in a in a normal market. But in general,

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Speaker 3: the US has been a lot less intervenive, certainly with

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Speaker 3: direct payments, uh than than the European Union, and so

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Speaker 3: American farmers tend to be much more what was leaner

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Speaker 3: and meaner. Uh you know, we've we've become a little

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Speaker 3: more aggressive about the market realities of the global market

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Speaker 3: of production costs and those sorts of things. And so

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Speaker 3: you know, I don't see that changing a tremendous amount

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Speaker 3: in the US anytime soon, Joel.

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Speaker 2: When COVID hit, of course, we saw the run on

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Speaker 2: the supermarkets with everything toilet goods, paper goods, food, everything went.

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Speaker 2: And that's when we were still producing things that are

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Speaker 2: regular basis. What happens if there's a downturn in production.

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Speaker 3: Well, yeah, the COVID, the COVID shortages were not because

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Speaker 3: we were underproducing. The COVID shortages were because of the

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Speaker 3: over buying. Well, no, it was it was it was

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Speaker 3: the glitches in the human resources. I mean we we

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Speaker 3: incinerated during COVID. We indcinerated millions of chickens, turkeys, pies,

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Speaker 3: and pigs. Not very many cows because they have a longer,

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Speaker 3: a longer chain, you know, from from farm to plate.

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Speaker 3: But the things that are that were the shortest, that

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Speaker 3: couldn't wait for uh for processing plants to restart, get

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Speaker 3: up and going, were the shorter, the shorter uh duration

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Speaker 3: things like pigs which only take about you know, six

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Speaker 3: to seven months, uh, chickens which take you know, six

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Speaker 3: to seven weeks, turkeys which take you know, uh, twelve

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Speaker 3: to fourteen weeks. And so those all that was all

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Speaker 3: that production was in the was in the front end

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Speaker 3: of the food chain. And when the big processing facilities

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Speaker 3: stopped to to retool and read you know, replexiglass if

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Speaker 3: you will, uh, they they ended up that they just

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Speaker 3: couldn't take these animals coming into pipeline, and so they

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Speaker 3: incinerated them. And and it shows the fragility of this

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Speaker 3: long of a long food chain. You know, we we

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Speaker 3: we say we think it's efficient, but actually it's extremely

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Speaker 3: fragile because of just in time, inventory ing and and

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Speaker 3: all the things of supposed efficiency actually creates high risk

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Speaker 3: and so so so COVID was not a production issue,

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Speaker 3: it was a processing issue. It was not on a

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Speaker 3: farm end. It was out on the processing end. Now,

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Speaker 3: if if farmers you know, produce less, then you know,

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Speaker 3: then you have another whole story. But I certainly don't

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Speaker 3: see American farmers, you know, reducing their production anytime soon.

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Speaker 3: And I mean the one thing that has reduced substantially

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Speaker 3: in the last eighteen months is beef cattle, and that's

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Speaker 3: primarily due to the drought from basically West Texas through Georgia, Louisiana, Alabama,

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Speaker 3: all those southern the southern tier of the US has

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Speaker 3: been in an incredible drought. Of course, now Texas is

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Speaker 3: on fire, that's burning up a lot of spring pasture

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Speaker 3: as well, and so the American cow herd is now

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Speaker 3: lower that has been since nineteen fifty. And that's one

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Speaker 3: reason why prices are going through the root, you know,

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Speaker 3: going up dramatically in the beef sector. It's not any

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Speaker 3: kind of government manipulation or farmers whatever you know, Lee

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Speaker 3: don't want to raise cows anymore. It's when there's no grass,

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Speaker 3: there's no cows, and that's a reduction. And so to

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Speaker 3: deal with that shoe, we need to confront well, how

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Speaker 3: do we ameliorate drought? I mean, are there things farmers

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Speaker 3: can do to reduce susceptibility to drought? And I would

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Speaker 3: suggest there are. You don't hear about that much mode

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Speaker 3: Mainly you just hear whining and complaining about the weather,

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Speaker 3: which farmers of course have done forever. But I kind

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Speaker 3: of have a three ingredient recipe for dealing with this

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Speaker 3: and uh and taking a lot of the edge off

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Speaker 3: of droughts. I mean we've had we've had floods and

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Speaker 3: droughts from time immemorial. Uh, those didn't just start in

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Speaker 3: the last you know, fifty years. And so if we

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Speaker 3: really want to get ahead of this drought situation, we

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Speaker 3: need to talk about how to you know, how to

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Speaker 3: reduce the vulnerability to drought. And there are definitely things

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Speaker 3: that we farmers can do. We've certainly done them here

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Speaker 3: on our farm to reduce drought. We we have we

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Speaker 3: average we have average four you know, a drought four

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Speaker 3: year out of five only one in five years. Do

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Speaker 3: we really not have a drought at all? And and

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Speaker 3: so they are routine, and we need to we need to,

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Speaker 3: you know, reduce that risk factor. We can, you know,

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Speaker 3: we can talk about that as you want to.

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Speaker 2: I had heard that China is buying up American farmland

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Speaker 2: like crazy. Is that true.

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Speaker 3: I wouldn't say buying it up like crazy. I would

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Speaker 3: say buying it up strategically. And the thing that's got

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Speaker 3: that there really isn't They're not buying that much acreage.

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Speaker 3: What they are buying is achorage near near strategic US

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Speaker 3: military assets and and so so it's not a whole

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Speaker 3: lot of acreage. The particular location of the acreage is

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Speaker 3: raising eyebrows and and so yeah, I don't think this

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Speaker 3: is a production issue so much as it is actual,

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Speaker 3: you know, kind of an espionage issue, if you will.

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Speaker 3: And that's what's raising the concern of a lot of people,

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Speaker 3: uh is not how much it is, but exactly where

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Speaker 3: it is.

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