The broad purposes of this paper are: 1. To review governmental intervention in agriculture in terms of reasons, objectives and means, and comment on some forces which seem to be changing the frame of reference and focus in which such intervention has previously occurred; 2. to identify some of the gaps in knowledge which hamper policy formulation at present and where the development of consistent programmes for the future is dependent upon the conscious seeking out of a wider range of information than hitherto.
The British Market Research Bureau has conducted a number of surveys among farmers on topics ranging from mechanical equipment to fertilisers. This paper draws principally on the latest - and one of the largest - of these surveys, which was carried out in the second half of 1967 . The survey, producing over 700 interviews throughout Great Britain (i.e. England, Wales and Scotland, but excluding the Republic of Eire and Northern Ireland) was concerned with crop chemicals and livestock feedstuffs as well as providing information on company images and company representation, and was commissioned by a major manufacturer. The paper will be concerned not with the results of that survey, which remain confidential to our client, but with three main areas of techniques: 1. Sampling; 2. Questionnaire design; 3. Interview procedure.
The purpose of this paper is to present a point of view, albeit a somewhat academic point of view, on some of the problems of research into the process of communicating with farmers, and on some of the needed research in this field. In essence, valid research in a social science (as in any other science) must be based on a theoretical foundation. Only thus can its findings be applied in situations other than merely those in which the research was undertaken. The function of communication is primarily to initiate, modify or change human attitudes, motivations and actions. It is thus within the context of changing human activity, of social change in a grand, total sense or at a small-scale, micro level, that the process of communication can be fully appreciated.
We are going to talk about mass communication problems not "in the abstract" , but in connection with their background, keeping in mind what we are actually looking for: total development of men and communities.
Throughout this paper, our attention was intentionally focused on the problems and difficulties with which agricultural policy is faced in regard to the 1possibilities and limitations of structural transformation. These were studied in the light of experience gained with the use of forecasting models. We did not by any standards explore all the alternative avenues, of such meaningful interpretations as can be given to the results of work with this technique. It appears, however, that both individual entrepreneurs engaged in the marketing of farm product and the empirical market researchers who advise them, can derive from these forecasts important pointers to entrepreneurial decisions. The estimates of future developments in supply and demand are particularly suitable for reducing the field of unknown and uncertain elements in the business calculations of farmers, food processors, merchants and co-operatives. Such forecasts assist them in their decisions relating to production, distribution and investment and can make, thereby, an important contribution to dissipating the uncertainties that surround a competitive market economy.
In this paper we intend to discuss not only the problems of communicating with farmers from the point of view of suppliers to this industry, but also the problems of communication with farmers as met by the marketing researcher. In the spring of 1967, we were commissioned by a manufacturer of animal feed, to carry out a study in two selected areas of the Federal Republic of Germany. The broad objective of this survey was to provide basic information regarding the present distribution- and marketing pattern, whereby an analysis was made of the competitive market-structure, the distribution channels, the role of the co-operatives etc. In addition however we were asked to study the attitude of the farmers regarding various product requirements, towards various brands, the role of price and finance support in purchasing decisions, while special attention was to be paid to the attitude towards and experiences with all sorts of advisory services.
The supply situation as such needs to be got under control, and I believe that more awareness amongst our farmers of their role in the economy and their entrepreneurial responsibility to themselves should be fostered. The government's role, I feel, should be directed towards the stimulation of alternative uses for the farmer's assets and the development of alternative skills.
I shall give some subjective views developed from irregular, recent but fairly frequent contacts with the dairy industry, mainly in Holland. To establish my audacity even further, I am talking to you as a marketer, not as a researcher.
Both the previous speakers have stressed the difference in approach between the policy markers' main advisor, the economist thinking in aggregate terms, and the marketing researcher in the commercial world, who is essentially concerned with problems at the level of the individual firm, and that this different approach leads frequently to misunderstanding. As far as agricultural marketing is concerned, the different approaches are typified as follows.
I consider that the need of the farmer to obtain a reasonable return on his capital investment has been insufficiently stressed in the papers that we have just heard. There is little doubt that the dairy cow produces a better level of economic return than any other animal.