Jack Rice
Rancher, Attorney | Born 1975
LARABEE
I’ll tell you what. Most people involved in agriculture are really good at snuffing out agricultural interest in their kids, because they tell ‘em that they can’t make money at it. They tell ‘em that it's really hard. They complain about the environmental regulations. They complain about how things were so much better before.
The really sad part about agriculture, is that people aren’t instilling in kids a hope for a future, because they can’t imagine a future that looks like their past. The problem is there’s no hope for the future of agriculture except the imagination of the youth. The imagination of our great, great grandparents, to come around the horn or across the plains, to come over here and find some ground and figure out how to make a livin’ on it - that took imagination. That took courage. The future generation needs to have that same imagination and courage, except it’s an entirely different looking realm.
So, if you could encourage your kids to believe in a future, and take some principles with ‘em, but recognize and warn ‘em that that future’s going to look different, then agriculture has some serious hope!