On the farm our tools range from the typical tractor and seeds to tablets and satellites. While some are more important than others, each tool has its place and without the others would not be as effective or efficient. Probably the most important tool we use is human capital. Our rural community is full of experts in their field. Our neighbor knows our tractors inside and out. Friends from high school now sell seed and fertilizer, recommending combinations that might work well in our fields. Agronomists, crop specialists, grain marketers . . . all these people live and work in our communities, proving that farming is not an insular activity, but very communal and very dependent on others.
It seems the world would like to talk only about GMOs, but on the farm we have to talk about more than that, because farming takes tools and lots of them. GMOs are one tool – a valuable one at that – and not the whole toolbox.