I would like to draw attention to Ryan Slabaugh’s article in the September issue, “Time to Leave Carbon Markets Behind.”
For those readers who have not yet priced any carbon credits, you are in for a rude awakening. This is just another system where those of us at the bottom of the pyramid are expected to take the price offered and be happy with what we are given. Make no mistake — this is not free money.
Slabaugh makes the point that companies expect us to sign up and take what they offer. The very companies providing synthetic fibers, meat, milk, leather and just about every other farm product we produce need to purchase these carbon credits. My carbon sequestration skills are not for sale to the companies who want to put me and my family out of business.
We have to band together and hold the line on this issue. Most all of us who read Acres U.S.A. magazine quit the commodity production model years ago. We carved out a niche market that pays us and our families a living wage. We did that to escape the “take it or leave it” marketplace.
The time has come to stand up at our agriculture meetings, be that the county cattlepersons association or at the national corn growers convention. We have to unify on this issue. The government has made it mandatory for these companies to purchase the carbon credits — they have to have our help. Take a few minutes to research the executives of the companies who need the carbon credits and those who control the $400 billion carbon marketplace. They are all making seven-figure salaries. Why are they getting to keep such huge amounts and expect you and I to be satisfied with the leftover crumbs?
Ask yourself what your time is worth when it’s 100 degrees in the shade and you have to unchoke the combine header, or when it’s three below and your kid’s prized heifer is calving in the snow and you’re stripped to the waist pulling her calf.
I don’t know about all of you, but my efforts are not for sale to the cheapest bidder — even if he is wearing a mohair suit!
Justin Watson
Springfield, Missouri
