ST. PETERS BAY, P.E.I. — St. Peters – Ila Matheson’s world has revolved around farming for about as long as she can remember.
Her family owns and operates Springwater Farm in St. Peters, where they raise sheep, chickens, a couple of pigs and one cow on their 317 acres.
“I’ve been toddling around here for a long time, but I don’t know what age I actually started working.”
Now, the 21-year-old is helping shape Canada’s agriculture and agri-food sector as one of 25 youth sitting on the Canadian Agricultural Youth Council (CAYC), which held its inaugural meeting virtually on Sept. 3.
Education
It was Matheson’s 4-H leader who first made her aware of the CAYC and she quickly applied.
“I’m a young woman in agriculture, a pretty traditional farming role. I’m studying agriculture; agriculture’s basically everything I do.”
Enrolled at the Dalhousie Agricultural Campus in Bible Hill, N.S., in her fourth year of an animal sciences degree, Matheson is taking a break from campus life. Instead, she’s completing a few business courses online as the university figures out how to handle its more hands-on courses.
After school, she wants to return to work on the family farm and continue shearing sheep, something she started doing.
When asked if she ever considered another career, she laughed.
“No, not really.”
As part of the application process for the council, Matheson wrote an essay on what she thought was the biggest issue facing agriculture.
She chose to write about consumer perception and how media and advertising have shaped how those outside the industry see it.
She believes education is key to changing misconceptions and getting more youth to consider a career in agriculture, something she hopes the council will be able to help with.
“I think if we were able to spread information, get the information out there and better educate people, that would address lots of the issues we talked about.”
First meeting
During that first meeting on Sept. 3, the 25 youth from across Canada made introductions and talked about some of the challenges facing agricultural industries, like farm succession, global warming and getting youth more involved.
“I think a lot of us were on the same page. Several things came up from a few different people and we all have similar ideas about what are strengths and weaknesses in Canadian agriculture.”
Though they didn’t get down to any nitty gritty planning yet, she said, it was nice to meet everyone and get an understanding of where everyone was coming from.
Many council members have farming backgrounds like Matheson and most have completed or are pursuing industry-related education, she said.
“But, there’s a good number who don’t as well, which is a good perspective to have.”
For Matheson, she sees herself being a strong presence for the foundation of the industry.
“I’d like to think I’m a voice for the primary producers … Farmers are at the foundation of the agricultural industry, so we’re kind of the bottom line.”