Episode: 14

Diljeet Brar

Transcript

Transcript Toban Dyck  00:03

This is the extensionist conversations with great thinkers in agriculture. I’m Toban Dyck and I’m Jay wetter. Hey, Toban. Hey Jay. We’re

Jay Whetter  00:14

going to talk to someone who you’ve met before. I haven’t why they Why did you think he would would be such a

Toban Dyck  00:22

good guest? I’m excited for you to meet. Oh geez, yeah, I think, yeah, I think you’re gonna, I think you’re gonna really enjoy the conversation. I heard him speak at a Manitoba farm writers event, and then him and I chatted a little bit after the event about agriculture and agriculture extension, and he talked about how he was an extension specialist or had been in previous roles. So later on, I contacted his office. He’s in MLA and I booked a meeting with him. So we chatted in his office. He’s willing to chat a like quick to respond. As a politician, you don’t always get that right. So quick to respond, happy to engage. You probably chatted about egg extension for, I don’t know, hour, hour and a half, easy. He recommended some books, and he talked about extension in ways that I had never heard before. And I think, I think I’m really

Jay Whetter  01:18

excited. Are you going to tell me that now, are we going to save that for that

Toban Dyck  01:22

I’m going to dance around. You’re going to be so excited.

Jay Whetter  01:29

You don’t have to blow your I like surprises.

Toban Dyck  01:33

No, no. So he talked about egg extension. As you know, we like write, writing songs based on, you know, egg extension, or to to disseminate egg extension messages or poems or or theater, or a variety of things. And I like, I just, I think it’s, you know, it’s just something that I haven’t seen done here, and I can’t help but think that it would be an effective tool to add to the pile.

Jay Whetter  02:08

I had a colleague, Clint, who used to write haikus about wherever he was, or canola or something. So maybe after this we’ll when we’re promoting this podcast, we can encourage people to write us a poem about some extension practice, yeah,

Toban Dyck  02:23

or a song. That’s a song I love. I just love that idea a lot. Yeah, good. Well, let’s get on with it. Let’s do it. I’m excited. We’re doing extension because we we value

Jay Whetter  02:41

it. Farmers are still looking for information, even while governments have pulled away from the job of extension so that. So, like you said, yeah, the needs there, and there’s fewer people actually doing extension. And so we thought we we jump into that, and we hope that sponsors recognize that the service that we’re offering and give us some support

Toban Dyck  02:59

as much as we are doing that because because we see a need and we have a passion for it, we’re also doing it because we see a need among some of the groups that could be sponsors, and we see that they are also looking for new ways to extend if anybody

Jay Whetter  03:12

else wants To step forward, we’d welcome their support as well.

Toban Dyck  03:22

You right on here we are. We’re the extensionist. I’m Toban Dyck. This is Jay wetter, hello. And today’s guest is Diljit Brar MLA for burrows and a extension expert. In my opinion. Dilge and I go back a little ways. You, you spoke at a, what was it? A Manitoba farm writers event, yes, that’s right. And then, and then I came to his office one day, and him and I chatted about ag extension, I don’t know fully, for an hour or two. We had a we had a great discussion. So thanks for coming. Dil G, we’re I think we’re both pretty excited to be chatting with you. And we’re not

Jay Whetter  04:05

talking politics at all today. We’re not you’re being MLA we’re talking about extension because you’ve had a long career talking to people about agriculture and talking to farmers about extension practices. But let’s go all the way back, because

Toban Dyck  04:21

how far back Are we going? So,

Jay Whetter  04:26

no, I want to talk about your farm, back in Punjab, and growing up on a farm. Can you, can you describe what that life was like? Yeah. Well,

Diljeet Brar  04:33

before that, I want to say thank you to both of you. I’m so happy to be part of this wonderful extensionists podcast. And you know, when I was reading through your introduction, it says you’re talking to researchers and innovators and farmers, I was thinking, who am I? Am I one of those? Or am I even an expert? You’re our

Jay Whetter  04:58

innovator? Yeah. But after this conversation, you will have shared some new ideas on extension that other people maybe hadn’t thought about. You’re an innovator,

Diljeet Brar  05:10

right? And I was thinking maybe you helped me understand who I am today. Okay, so to your question, you wanted to know about my connection with agriculture,

Jay Whetter  05:22

right? I want to go right back to your roots. Yes,

Diljeet Brar  05:26

I was born and raised in a family who farmed for generations, and I’m no, I’m not very much proud of saying this that I’m going to say right now, I’m the first person in my family history who is not actively farming.

Jay Whetter  05:46

How far back are we talking like on the prairies, we think old is 100 years ago. But do you know how long your family has been farming?

Diljeet Brar  05:53

I don’t know, since we can think of like because we are farming family and Punjab, the province I come from is, is a farming province, and all people in my village around me, my relatives and my maternal and paternal grandparents and their relatives, they’re they’re all farmers, like 99% of them, right? My parents, though, they retired as school teachers, but they still farmed Okay, as a side job. So my younger brother, He is an educator. He is Associate Professor at Fresno State University, teaches horticulture, works with the farmers, and I thought both of us not, are not actively farming. Actually, he bought a small farm,

Jay Whetter  06:45

not being a farmer, right? And how do your when your parents found out that you and your brother were not going to be farmers? Was that a very sad day?

Diljeet Brar  06:55

It was actually opposite. Yeah, yes, because my parents valued education very much, and they wanted us, both the boys, to be in academics. So they sent both of us to the universities. They actually wanted me to be a doctor. So I did my, you know, medical sciences, grade 11 and 12, and then, like they wanted me to be a doctor, I didn’t want to be a doctor. I wanted to go into agriculture, connecting back to your point and first question. I was in grade eight when I switched from my optional subject art and craft, which is drawing. They call it to agriculture, because there was an option in my school. I was very young, grade eight, you know, right? I don’t know why, but I did. I got that optional subject, agriculture and started studying it. And maybe there were some role models, my cousins or my dad’s friends, kids. They were in the university. They were a few years older than me, and I heard stories about them, and somehow I decided in my head that I’m going to study at Punjab Agricultural University. I now realize that, but I never realized when I was thinking this. And then finally, after grade 12, I got into Punjab agriculture University, which is a great, world renowned Institute, and its model is exact same model as land grant universities in the US, so that Research Extension and teaching model, and I was so blessed to study there and be a student. And then I I taught in the same university as Assistant Professor in agriculture extension. Before

Jay Whetter  08:59

we go, go any farther, can you paint me a picture of what your farm looked like? What crops? Yeah, what did you Yeah, I want to know what what does. What did your family this 1000s of years old farm in Punjab look like

Diljeet Brar  09:16

we are sitting and recording this podcast in Manitoba? Yeah, so it’s not like Manitoba first of all, when we talk about the farm size, but yes, crops, yes, similar. Some crops are similar. For example, we grow wheat, barley, oats, corn, sunflower, no. Soy means lentils, right, and so on. So these grain crops are similar and cotton. When I was a kid, I used to go with my father and grandfather to my little farm. We have small farms there, and. We never owned a tractor till date, never we would rent a tractor for seeding, and we would rent a combine for harvesting. And I remember when the cropping patterns changed from growing cotton to Rice, and we were threshing right by hand, by beating the rice plants against, you know, against a wooden board or a broken door. I don’t know. I was in grade four or five at that time, and I still remember that scene. And it was a blue colored door, broken door, and we were beating the rice plants and shelling. So that’s the cropping pattern. Yeah, we have dairy, we have horticultural crops. We have citrus in Punjab, we have guava, we have grapes, and there are so many other fruit crops, like Bear is traditional crop people in the Western world don’t know about what is it? It’s a small, small, tiny fruit, like, I don’t know. I can, I can

Toban Dyck  11:13

sweet, sweet or sour? No,

Diljeet Brar  11:15

it’s a mix, yeah, sweet and sour. And there are various kinds of bears, but now agriculture University have, like, scientists working on, you know, red ready development in bear crops, like trees, right? And we have clubs, we have peach, we have pear. Like, it’s, it’s a beautiful, productive land. And it’s like, geographically, it’s so tiny province when you look at the whole geography of India, but this province is contributing maybe 40 to 50% of rice and wheat. That’s just a guess, like a big chunk of the food grains to the Central Food pool, right? So the food security depends a lot on on this.

Jay Whetter  12:05

India was with 1.4 billion people, yeah, I think it’s a third the size of Canada. But most of the country is agricultural, yeah, and the country is largely self sufficient in food, which is amazing. I would the one and only time I ever milked a cow was when, when we went back to my dad’s college that he worked at in the 60s. This is just a few years ago in Gujarat. Yeah, I’ve only milked a cow once in my life, and it was in India. Is that right? Yeah. And they would make and maybe with the citrus that grew in the area, but they would make buttermilk, yeah, and they, they, I would get served buttermilk for breakfast, and it was delicious. And I just thought, I thought buttermilk was gross, based on what I would buy in the grocery stores here. But I’m

Diljeet Brar  12:52

getting nostalgic now. My great grandmother used to prepare that fresh butter every single day she would be using, you know, hand churning of milk and preparing that fresh butter every single day. And now I can, I can virtually see my great grandmother right now. You know that that was the way of life, yeah. And it was beautiful. It was really, really beautiful.

Toban Dyck  13:22

So as you got into university, what? What got you interested in extension, specifically, uh,

Diljeet Brar  13:28

first of all, agriculture, I had some thoughts in my mind, or maybe, uh, wish to connect back to my my people, the farmers and the families I come from, I wanted to give back to them, and I wanted to see myself as an ag professional from the land where I want to go back and serve right my uncles and aunts maybe disseminate that scientific information to the same families that I come from, or sometimes many of my friends when, when they were studying at penna agriculture University, and then they studied like, three agronomy courses and went back to the farm, right? And started preaching their parents, they would be like, go away. You don’t know nothing. That’s

Toban Dyck  14:20

not how you do it,

Jay Whetter  14:22

all right. So preaching didn’t work, yeah,

Diljeet Brar  14:26

didn’t work at that young age, at that young Oh, I see at that young age,

Jay Whetter  14:30

does preaching work at at an older age, okay?

Diljeet Brar  14:36

You have to be very careful, yeah, somebody shared this story with me, somebody, one of my friends, met an extension worker who worked with farmers, maybe for three decades, and at his retirement event party, he was sharing his experiences. Hmm. And he said, one of my clients, a farmer, called me one day and has said, Hey, say he was Bob. Hey, Bob, can you visit my farm? I need some technical information right away. He went to him. He didn’t need any technical information. Actually, he was depressed, he wanted help, and he was planning to commit suicide that day. And the guy said I sat together with him for a couple of hours and talked about mutual connection, because he was like a family to the to the scientist or the extension worker, right? And he said, I’m so proud to be the reason for him living today, because I could help him. So why I’m quoting this example is that extension education basically is not just sending a message out. You can simply text somebody or send an email that this is the dose of the nitrogen or the pesticide you should apply and they would apply. This is not how it works. It’s about human relationship. It’s about connecting with people. And there is a difference between subject matter, extension specialist and an extension worker. So when we talk about technology, transfer or diffusion of innovation, or adopt or adoption of technology, and when we talk about extension education, these are totally two different things. If I talk about transfer of technology, it’s that I have this technology. I have this new seed or variety, and I want to send the information, and you know, info package, to the farmers and they would seed it. Extension education actually deals with changing the behavior of the farmers to help them make good decisions for their farm. For example, Extension Education aims at changing knowledge, skill and attitude of a farmer, and that’s what constitutes behavior. So when you change the behavior of a farmer and enable them to make good decisions for their firm that’s extension education, because that’s my subject. I did my Master’s in extension education. And Toban wanted to ask, Why? Why extension? Yeah, interesting story here. First course, entomology, 101, if I remember that correctly, I want to mention Dr, J, s, man. He still works in agriculture. He is in BC. Now he was my first entomology teacher. Such a wonderful professor. He taught us in a way that he connected me with the subject. And I was like, I was in second year. My course was four years, BSE agriculture honors, and I decided that I’m going to specialize in entomology or plant protection. So that’s what I did.

Jay Whetter  18:13

But okay, there’s something there that we need to dig into. Okay, what? Why? Why was he and so, yeah, so you can’t just say that he was inspired, but, I mean, we need to know how, because that’s if there sounds like there’s a really important skill there. Yeah,

Diljeet Brar  18:31

wonderful. I can, I can remember that we were dissecting a grasshopper, and there was a junior teacher who was taking over practical, and Dr Mann was the senior teacher. There was a combination a team of two teachers, and the way he explained about the dissection process and and, you know, expressed his knowledge and educated us about the body parts of Grasshopper, like I was getting everything that doesn’t happen in every class, so somehow we vibed together. I

Jay Whetter  19:11

need to build on this, because we interviewed Tracy Herbert in episode nine.

Toban Dyck  19:18

And you remember, it’s episode nine. That’s very impressive anyway, yeah,

Diljeet Brar  19:22

which one is this 20? We don’t know. Yeah, right, exactly.

Jay Whetter  19:28

But we didn’t, we didn’t talk about this in the episode, but afterwards, on social media, I was communicating with Tracy, yeah, and she had just read something afterwards, and it was that we can tell someone, and this applies to any and anywhere, but there’s the knowledge. But to take knowledge into action is different, and it has to do with showing or demonstrating, like getting your hands into it. Yeah. So with this dissection Exactly. So this teacher didn’t just talk to you about the anatomy of a grasshopper, but showed you with passion, and you’ve never forgotten it. And this is, this is a 101, entomology, 101, or 201, class, yeah. And I think there’s something to that, that demonstration, or at least doing something memorable, yeah, to transfer the knowledge, it’s just, you can’t just read a book or hear a lecture, but it’s like, let’s, let’s get our hands dirty and learn. And then it’s last, and then it’s in you,

Diljeet Brar  20:38

right? I want to jump in here. It’s not about what’s being taught or what’s being said. It also matters who says it. Who says it, for example,

Jay Whetter  20:49

as an expert like

Diljeet Brar  20:54

it’s about the connection again, so if a teacher empathizes and comes to the level, or matches the level of the students, their age, their level of knowledge, right, whatever stage in life they are, and then matches that level. And then when you, when you talk to a child, 11 years old, you bow down on your knees and talk to them eye to eye. That’s how they get the things better, rather than like looking up at a six feet tall guy, right? So just a metaphor. So I think Dr mon connected with us as a class so much well that many of us still appreciate the way he thought, wow, so, so what? What I did? And finally, it was like, yes, my specialization would be entomology and plant pathology, which is collectively called plant protection. Yeah, I signed for it. My first class, another professor. He was a wonderful professor as well. I showed up for the class, and class was in session. It was the first class at 9am and my professor was he knew my name. My name is Diljit pal. Full Name is Diljit pal. Diljit Paul. What’s the time? They said, Sir, this is 9am he goes, it’s 901. Never show up late. I don’t know what happened to me. I went back to the dean’s office, pulled my papers back and changed it to extension education, really, yes,

22:38

that’s, that’s one minute that changed your life,

Diljeet Brar  22:41

the one minute, I don’t know it was just that incidence, or it was tipping of scale, or I was divided between being a bridge between the scientific community and the farmers, which is transfer of technology, extension education, because I did a little bit of theater and performing arts, and I had those communication skills that I wanted to utilize to transfer that technology. And maybe that was my second best stream I wanted to get into, and that incidence gave it a push, and I converted to extension education and extension education, economics and sociology, that was my specialization, and I’m not regretting this subject gave me a lot of exposure and confidence. I was such a shy student, I never asked a question to my professor in my class, I was so shy, coming from a rural area and village, had no exposure to the world, and that’s the way I was. But this subject, are we talking about performing art? So extension education. Extension education, yeah, extension education. Let me study communication skills, extension education. Let me study psychology, sociology, micro and macro, economics and photography. There was one photography course, oral communication course, and it, you know, it’s, it’s a mix of science and humanities, right? Extension is, yeah, yeah, management, management. We studied extension administration. They call, like, Human Resources kind of thing. Human Relations was another subject. So I tried to understand people along with plants. So sometimes I say I’m more inclined towards people than plants. So rather than being a plant breeder or being agronomy specialist agronomist or a horticulturist, I decided to be a people’s person, and I never regretted. I wrote a lot for farmers. Uh, on various subjects, and I presented TV programs. It’s not about me, it’s about extension education, the subject that gave me that exposure and opportunity to serve the farming community and agricultural sciences and the ag industry.

Jay Whetter  25:19

What are you gonna I just don’t want a question. Well, we can’t let the performing arts the poetry. We can’t let that just we’re not going to let it go. When are we do you want to ask your question? Or do you want to dig into that right now? Yeah, let’s dig into that. The Performing Arts. Tell me again, what was your training, or was that just your personal interest, like you mentioned Performing Arts. Was that through university? Or what was that for?

Diljeet Brar  25:50

We used to have a dance drama and music club, yeah, so I joined that dance drama and music. I was at the forks many time in my life, when I was in first year university, I loved soccer. That was the only sport I knew, being raised in a village, right? That’s what we played in school. And I signed up for soccer. And then the next week, folk dance training class was announced. I was interested to learn folk dance. Both the practices were at the same time, 5pm I had to choose one. I dropped soccer, yeah, I got into performing arts. And then I was selected into university folk dance team, which performed at like intra college festivals and Inter University festivals and then, you know, national competitions. And we won national competitions as well. That taught me teamwork dynamics and even being a captain of the team. You know, I learned a lot how to manage your friends and your your teammates and stuff, right? So that was good exposure that came through that performing arts thing. And I had friends who were very good in theater, and they have been, they’re still using as agricultural scientists, as professors, they’re still using theater as a tool to disseminate agricultural information. Yeah, this

Toban Dyck  27:30

is, this is incredibly interesting, because I think this is, this is something relatively new to the extension landscape in Western Canada. Toban

Jay Whetter  27:40

and I are going to write a play and perform it at an egg days. We would

Toban Dyck  27:44

love, since you, isn’t it a great idea. So since you and I first chatted, or second chatted, and when

Diljeet Brar  27:50

I when I suggest to you to read a big book, uh, diffusion of innovation by Rogers and Shoemaker, I think, yeah, you bought that. I bought the book. I want to see that after the podcast, yeah, I thought you’re

Toban Dyck  28:05

gonna see it.

Jay Whetter  28:07

I don’t believe you, Matt. And I want to see that the spine has been created. I

Diljeet Brar  28:12

love that book, yeah, all right. But

Jay Whetter  28:14

that performing arts as a theater,

Toban Dyck  28:17

yes, theater. Performing Arts, that intersection of those, those mediums and an extension, very, very interested in that, and like, what the opportunities could be for extension in Manitoba, Western Canada, to use some of those, those tools. What do you see? Well,

Diljeet Brar  28:36

there’s a possibility, yeah, but not like in developing countries, when we talk about India, and, you know, thickly populated countries and provinces like that, you can go to a village in the evening with university students, and they prepared a 25 minutes play on, maybe cotton production, or, you know, pesticide use or overuse of pesticides and pollution or burning the straw. It could be any theme, right? And you announced that, and you’re, you’re performing that play in a village, and there are like 200 people watching it in the evening, and

Jay Whetter  29:16

it’s a play like theatrical. Hello, I’m, a farmer, and then this person walks on stage, and I’m the extension expert. You should stop burning your straw. Like, how. Okay,

Diljeet Brar  29:28

let me explain that. Okay. Now imagine, like, it’s not simply role playing, like, okay, an individual, for example, you’re playing as a caterpillar. Okay, okay, yeah. And we’re talking about like, ball worms in cotton, yeah, right. And one of them is a pesticide dealer who is focused on selling more pesticide, yeah. And then an ag expert, which is public extension agent, yeah? Or extension. Education Specialist. He’s educating the farmers about not overusing judicious use of pesticides. And interestingly, I got a chance to translate some, you know, those compact discs, CDs. We got some CDs. It was like 44 cities from Indian Council of agricultural research, India is a diverse country, and it was, you know, the CDs were in Hindi language, but my province speaks Punjabi, and I remember me and my brother, we spent a few nights in a studio like this, and we did all the dubbing word by word in Punjabi language. And one of the series were so much interesting. It talked about wool production, sheep, sheep production, and there was role playing, like sheep talking to sheep, and imagine the dialog, Hey, Sister, how are you producing?

Jay Whetter  31:09

How was the sheep dip? Was it itchy? Like itchy after

Diljeet Brar  31:12

so to make it interesting, to make your message interesting, when we talk about extension education, we also talk about message distortion. We used to do an exercise at our professional development courses, as you know, assistant professors, we used to go for trainings, so there would be 20 people sitting in a row around a table, and I say something to you quietly in your ear, and you pass that message to the next person, and the message sent by the first person is not the message that you hear back from the 20th person. That is called message distortion. I love that. Yeah, it’s a good message distortion that happens, that happens everywhere. So we have to make sure the scientific message is not distorted before reaching to the stakeholders or end users. So that’s, that’s the skill

Jay Whetter  32:13

Have you did. So as kids, we used to play a game called telephone, yeah, exactly that. Whisper something and somebody, and it would go all the way around the room, and then the last person would say what they heard. And it was like, you said

Diljeet Brar  32:25

totally, totally different, right at

32:27

a meeting. But

Toban Dyck  32:28

among adults, yeah, people would think, how could it be different? Like, how could that be distorted? But to show that it actually could be, would be so fun. Would be, I think, quite, quite impactful. I was just

Jay Whetter  32:38

thinking of a play. So we’re talking there’s these new these new thresholds for grasshoppers, and we’re also taking in into account nymph days, not nymph stage, not just adults. And so there’s a new threshold of 30 to 45 nymphs per square meter. And I was just thinking, so, so we’re on stage, and we’ve got all these people dressed up as grasshoppers. You got babies dressed up as grasshoppers to be the nymphs, and then, and so that. So there’s, there’s 20 per square meter, and the farmer wants to spray, and the Accenture say, whoa. Like, not. That’s not ready yet. And then more people come on, and then we get to that 30 threshold, and then they’re like, Okay, and so that’s all the all these people dressed up as grasshoppers and like, like, all ages you. And then you’re like, Okay, now you can spray. And then he goes and sprays

Diljeet Brar  33:27

them all. Yeah, that’s wonderful. You remind me about my time in Manitoba, when I would go to collect data from the ditches roadside and in the Interlake, yeah? And you have to count those grasshoppers in a square meter. How hard is

33:44

that? Right? We should have to riding all around the state,

Toban Dyck  33:48

right? You’re not going to forget that. Yeah,

Diljeet Brar  33:50

and I want to add this, we were talking about theater. We’re talking about poems and songs written about various themes in agriculture, for example, why to burn straw because it pollutes a beautiful thing that one of my friends who works as a professor there, he did was, you know that snake and leather game? Yeah, yes, Snake and leather game for farmers, yeah. So it would be snake and ladder game, yeah. But you did something like you, you chose a wrong pesticide or a herbicide. You go down, yeah, you did the right thing. For example, you know, mixed farming, or, you know, these, you know, for example, any green manure crops, yeah, you jump up the ladder, right?

Jay Whetter  34:43

So did you just make this up? Right now? No, you’ve heard it’s

Diljeet Brar  34:46

right there. I’m saying that on record, yes, yeah, people are using that. And it’s not just for the for the farmers. It could be used in, for example. Why EVs are better than you know, gas guzzlers. You make a game about educating extension education is not just for agriculture. It’s for Veterinary Sciences. It’s for it’s for politics. It’s for you said, we’re not talking about politics. It could be for medical sciences, it could be for health, it could be for any subject. Extension education is basically educating the community, and I repeat, changing people’s knowledge, skill and attitude that ultimately, that ultimately changes their behavior to make better decisions. Just for example, negotiating power. You’re selling your produce in the market. How to negotiate better, how to search better markets. You can maybe educate farmers how to use internet better, how to build confidence, how to how to talk to somebody, how to have a, you know, conversation, a professional conversation. It could be anything. We are not simply sending or throwing a message of technology in front of anybody, the end users. It’s about, it’s about strengthening their abilities to make better decisions on their farm, to make things better for them. That’s why we say that learning by doing. We say that helping the farmers to help themselves, it’s not about buying somebody two pounds of fish. It’s about teaching them how to fish. So that is extension education.

Jay Whetter  36:50

4h for adults. 4h

Diljeet Brar  36:53

for adults. You remind me of 4h Okay? Jay Toban, tell me like 4h clubs. I studied about those four H’s, right? Yeah. And they have their own, you know?

Jay Whetter  37:07

You know what they are. I grew up. I grew up in 4h

Diljeet Brar  37:11

Yeah, you can remind me about hands and heart and health and

Jay Whetter  37:16

head, head, head, heart health and hands, yes,

Diljeet Brar  37:19

right? That’s a beautiful model. I am a big fan of that model, 4h clubs, but I strongly feel that we need to for to promote 4h clubs in urban areas in western world. Why, especially Manitoba example. Manitoba example is like 60% of Manitobans live in Winnipeg.

Jay Whetter  37:43

Yeah, at least, yeah. At least. Right.

Diljeet Brar  37:46

So those 60% families, their next generation, children and school children and even themselves, they do not that get that opportunity to to know about land, animals, agriculture, camping, even, and other stuff that happens in 4h clubs. I think we need to develop a model, or maybe find some leaders. The biggest problem in 4h is can’t find leaders. It is to find 20 leaders in Winnipeg and start 4h clubs in Winnipeg. And those kids who like do not know about agriculture. This is, see, this is the click. I have two boys, 21 and 12, if I talk to them. Hey, do you want to get into agriculture? They’re like, No, because agriculture, to them, is like getting their hands dirty and, you know, animals and rural area. But if I twist the question, like, Hey, boys, are you interested in food production? Would be like, interesting? Yes.

Jay Whetter  39:03

The 4h sub motto, it fits the theme of what we’re talking about, because it’s learn to do by doing. Yes, which is, which is what Tracy Herbert was trying to say. I mean, getting getting your hand, well, maybe your sons don’t want to get their hands dirty, but, but, like, figuratively, like getting in there and doing something and learning it, because you’re you’re through trial and error, you’re making mistakes, and you’re eventually learning how to cook or fix a lawn mower or do woodworking or raise a calf or grow a crop. But I do think there’s something to that extension using a kind of the 4h model, yeah, something to that, and then using it and encouraging urban, urban kids to do 4h or even urban

Diljeet Brar  39:47

adults there, I think there are many ways to connect them to agriculture, right?

Jay Whetter  39:51

And I mean that could draw them into agriculture, because we need more people involved in ag. Culture, and

Diljeet Brar  40:00

we need to redefine what agriculture is for the outer world. We are talking about agriculture because you know about agriculture. You know about farms you you lived in both of you, you lived in rural Manitoba, but somebody, a family, who has never lived in a rural area for last like, 126 years I How would they know about agriculture? And when you talk about farming and agriculture, all they think about is crop production. Yeah, it’s not like we need accountants in agriculture, yeah. We need, you know, software development, developers in agriculture. We need to. We need people who use drones in agriculture.

Jay Whetter  40:46

We need mental health experts. We need engineers. We need we need lawyers,

Diljeet Brar  40:52

economics, economic economists, right? So we need to tell people that this is all agriculture, and when we talk about labor shortage in agriculture, especially in Manitoba, I don’t know, by 2029 I don’t know, don’t quote me, but I guess that every like fifth, sixth position in agriculture would be vacant. Where would that workforce come from? Unless we, you know, develop them here or especially, I want to mention this people like me who are internationally trained agrologists. I got my professional agrologist status in BC first and then in Manitoba, right? And there are many people like me who have been either teaching in a university or working in ag industry, they bring years of experience, and they are a gift to Manitoba and Canada, and sometimes we fail to utilize those skills and individuals and human resources for the benefit of our economy. Why can’t we have some bridging courses for internationally educated agrologists, right? Yeah, and utilize them. Because if you have to develop an agrologist from scratch, we need money, we need resources. We need to have some inputs by the universities and whatnot, right? And if, if you’re getting those, as in the form of internationally educated agrologists, nurses, doctors, lawyers. You give them just a little push, yeah? And teach them a few courses, and they’re ready to serve. We need to think about that. Really think about that, right? Yeah? Future Farmers of America, somebody told me. FFA, yeah, I don’t know much about that, but I’m told that in America there is, for example, 4h I think 4h is, is available in America as well. It is, but there is Future Farmers of America. They involve school kids, and there are competitions held like science fairs, for example. There would be school students grading produce. For example, they would be grading citrus at a like a fair, at a fair. And then there is a panel of these little children, like 1213, year old children. And then there are judges. They ask them question, and then they prune trees. And, for example, they judge the quality of grain. And maybe they talk about soil type. They talk about healthy calves or healthy cattle, what are the parameters of judging a bull, for example, right? And then they start connecting to nature through plants and animals and agriculture, that’s where their connection starts as my connection started with agriculture as a grade eight student. I think we need to do something like

Jay Whetter  44:06

Future Farmers of America we have Ag in the Classroom in Canada. Would you say that similar or

Diljeet Brar  44:12

that is beautiful? I know people at Ag in the Classroom. I meet them occasionally. When I was working with mental agriculture for a few years, we attended events together, and we even organized events together, and and and ag experts in mentor agriculture department, they would, they would talk about environment and sustainability and food production, and, you know, identification of grains. They have a little kit that they send to the schools. I still don’t know if they send it to many urban schools in the city, but they do send that kit for for example, what’s the difference between a corn grain and a wheat grain and a barley grain and oats? Green, right? When

Jay Whetter  45:00

all you see is Doritos and a loaf of bread, because that’s what,

Diljeet Brar  45:05

that’s why I can say that milk comes from superstore. So we need to, we need to do something about educating. I think these, these kids, yeah,

Toban Dyck  45:16

I do what I do want to touch before we before we don’t, don’t touch on this. You know, last time you and I met Dyck, we talked, you talked a little bit about the difference between farming and agriculture, and how agriculture is as a term. To unpack that a little bit, because it does have the word culture in it, and I like to kind of talk about that a little bit more. Yeah, that’s interesting.

Diljeet Brar  45:40

I wear this turban, right? I want to put this on record as well. I’m blessed to be the first turbaned MLA in Manitoba history, and I feel proud about it. So when you talk about pride and when you talk about farming and agriculture, if you see a turbaned person in Manitoba or in Canada, you can safely guess that 95% chances that this guy is from a farming, family farming background, right then, if, if I talk About prairie farmers, if I talk about cattle farmers, they have a big hat on their head, yeah? Well, that’s a, that’s the dress. They would have a, you know, thick belt and that big buckle and jeans and stuff, and big, big boots, right? Safety boots, yeah, and they work at farm in that attire. But guess what? Yeah, that’s their culture. Guess what? When they go to the conferences in Winnipeg, at Victoria inn, for example, or they have a maybe dinner at Manitoba legislature, they’re still wearing big

Jay Whetter  46:56

hats and their COVID, yeah, yeah.

Diljeet Brar  46:59

Like, why? Because they feel proud of who they are. That’s the right. They feel proud about the land ownership. They feel proud about being a farmer. And why not to be proud of that? That is the connection between, you know, humans and the land, humans and nature, human and animal. Okay, I see so many farmers who are grain farmers, right? I’ve visited so many farms in Manitoba by now, because I was with Manitoba Agriculture between 2014 and 2018 Yeah,

Jay Whetter  47:39

we should say that you were the extension coordinator? Yeah,

Diljeet Brar  47:42

I was, AG, extension coordinator. So when you go to your go to a farm and that farmer called producer here, I don’t know why they call it producer. Farmer is the for me, farmer is the better term. Anyways, yeah, they have chickens running at the farm. They have a donkey, they have a llama, alpaca, maybe two sheep and three ducks, and they’re living with them. What is that that’s not a business? What is that that is something to be proud of, because they love it. We have dogs in the cities, so that human nature connection is very sacred. We need to emphasize that. We need to bring those people and next generation children to the farmer by any means, right? We need to emphasize the need to connect back to the land, right? It could be through agriculture. Could be taught as an optional subject in schools. There could be a kitchen garden, community garden in the backyard of the school, and kids could could work with the plants, and some of them do in the cities too. And another thing that I wonder about is agri tourism. When you Google agri tourism, it’s it’s available. There are very many projects in many countries. But how about Manitoba? Can we have a pilot project, which is agri tourism, like Jay’s farm or toban’s farm? You have a, you know, a little apartment, or a, you know, trailer home there, yeah, and you offer people, Hey, stay and spend a weekend here and go harvest some vegetables and cook and, you know, touch a goat, touch a sheep, and that would work. People go camping too. So I think agritourism is an opportunity. I would call it ag education, and we can. Yeah, we can, we can give it a try.

Jay Whetter  50:02

I was thinking back to extension, and we finally got around to saying that you’re an extension specialist with with management of agriculture. I’m expecting you. Maybe you did do performance art and poems and that. But what like do you have? Did you pick up certain skills in that role that were most effective and that maybe are underutilized? So what things worked for you when you were doing that?

Diljeet Brar  50:31

Well, first of all, being, you know, I look different. Fortunately, I didn’t face a barrier connecting with farmers in Manitoba, I don’t know. Like for example, random name, David Furman, for example, farms north of auerberg, and it could be tomorrow. David picks up phone and Oh, Darwin, sorry, Darwin Furman and Darwin picks up phone and call. Hey, Diljit. How’s everything? What is your government doing? So you connect with those farmers? I connected well being from a different, you know, country being new to Canada, I was able to do that. Now, think about somebody who was born and raised in Interlake, had their diploma in agriculture from UFM, by the way, I don’t know if we are able to fill all the spots in diploma in agriculture these days? I don’t know, but if that program is underutilized, let’s work more. And how about somebody from Interlake going back after complete completing their studies, going back to their uncles and aunties and their neighbors, farms, disseminating agriculture information. There is a trustworthiness. There is reliability, because that’s our boy, that’s our girl, that’s our child who is educating us. So it’s not about again, what is being said. It’s about who says it. So I, I picked up like, you know, I picked up good skills, maybe language skills, and I connected with them. But couple of days back, it doesn’t

Jay Whetter  52:38

have to be a local person not

Diljeet Brar  52:41

having your that is one of the traits, yeah, okay, that’s one of the elements that connects you. I connected back because I start saying that I come from a farming background, okay, they feel like I’m from Interlake. So the other day, I was visiting hut, right colony, and people like the way they hosted us, they showed us their, you know, production facility and stuff. And all of a sudden I was like, Hey, do you know Heidi? It was like, yes, that is a neighboring colony, and this guy is standing right there. He said, Yeah, me and hardy are friends. I connected, yeah? And he said, Okay, I’ll text him that I met Diljit. Oh, that’s great.

Jay Whetter  53:33

Do you know In, I mean, in North American culture business, we just get right into the business, yeah, and sometimes that’s effective, but I think until you had made it clear that you you were from a farm, like, is it making? Is making that connection first a key step in extension

Diljeet Brar  53:57

in every communication, as a politician, as a university professor, as an extension coordinator, as a director of a cultural organization, as head of any project that I might have done in my life. My first point should be to connect with the people I’m working with. You. You’re, for example, you’re taking greetings on behalf of the government at Dairy Farmers conference or, AG, days, the first thing could be throwing a joke, yeah, connect with them. Unless you connect with them, you would not be able to pass the message on. Yeah, so connection is the first thing. And there are many, many ways to to connect. It’s, it’s not very simple to disseminate technology like diffusion. We’re talking about that book, diffusion of innovations. Okay, we have. Electric Vehicles again, and we know that they are environment friendly. Why is not every single person in Manitoba going to buy an EV tomorrow? Technology is available, so that innovation is available, but there are some, but you know why?

Jay Whetter  55:21

I know you’re talking hypothetically, but I mean, they the range is too short. The range drops in winter. They cost way too much. So there’s lots of reasons why they don’t but, yeah, so, but actually

Toban Dyck  55:34

support his point, yeah,

Diljeet Brar  55:35

and the technical language, they say it the innovations, complexity relative advantage, it’s trial ability, it’s observability. I don’t know the details of every single element that I’m listing here, but is it possible for a farmer to try a new innovation, for example, a seed. Yeah? They can get, like, you know, 100 grams of seed and try it at their farm. That’s trial ability, yeah. But how about a combine? Right? How would they try a combine? They cannot get a combine for pre for a month and try it and then return it right. So those are the attributes of an innovation that determine about its adoption. Again, diffusion of innovation is how a technology diffuses in a society, goes from this person to that, that person this form to that form. That’s a diffusion. But adoption, adoption is a very, very different process. Adoption is a process of decision making by an individual to have that technology fully adopted at their farm or in their life. And there are, again, categories of adoption that I wanted to share. For example, there are some innovators, okay, you heard about this technology right away. I got it at their farm. And then there are early adopters. They come after that, like maybe 20% say, right? And then there is early adopters, and there is early majority, and then there is late majority, and there are laggards. So laggards would be the ones who would adopt that particular technology when everybody has already adopted it, and then it doesn’t end there. How about not continuing to adopt that technology? You tried something, then you dropped it, no. So it’s a very complex process of diffusion of innovations and adoption of technology. It’s not that you wrote a fact sheet in in a newspaper and people read and adopted No, no, no, no, no, you have to see. What are the factors that work in Manitoba? What are the factors that work in a particular province in China and India? Yeah, and and South America, because there could be some technologies that are good for a business perspective, but they’re not culturally appropriate for a particular community, that technology would not be adopted, right? So it’s not just about business and affordability. It’s way more than that. It’s way deeper than that. Yeah, I

Toban Dyck  58:44

think it’s interesting, like the EV examples, interesting one, because it intersects with what you said earlier about culture, right? So there’s, there’s all these, these potential adoptions that fit within the current culture of agriculture, right? Like, which is like a new combine or a new variety that you want to grow. But for some reason, electric vehicles is outside of agriculture, so it doesn’t fit with that current mold. So there is, like, there’s almost extra work that that innovation has to do to penetrate that audience. And that’s an interesting one. It’s an interesting way to think about

Diljeet Brar  59:26

it. Okay, another example, for example, iPhone versus Android Sure. Say we’re not talking about agriculture extension anymore. We’re talking about diffusion of an innovation. It could be non agriculture, which is technology here. Yeah, so there must be some reasons that, like, you’re having iPhone and your son, or your daughter or your family member is having an Android, like you’re you’re not culturally different. You’re earning maybe. Comparable salaries, you live in same part of the world, but still, there is something that is making that choice. So that is adoption, but diffusion is that iPhone is everywhere, so that technology is diffused in the society, but this person never used an iPhone was always Android, or vice versa. So it’s complex. And I also want to touch base on research and extension India I come from, and I had three tier system in my university. There is a director, there is a vice chancellor. We call President here, there is director of research. There are 500 scientists working under him. They’re all research. There is Dean of agriculture college, Dean of veterinary college and basic sciences college and home economics and home science college that is teaching. And there is director of extension education. And there are assistant professors and associate professors and extension specialists working under that Directorate of extension education. That’s the model, right? But when I come to Canada, I talk about, hey, I did my Master’s in Extension Education. Unlike 99% of the times where I’m being introduced, people introduce me as Daljit did his master’s in education? No, yeah, very extension. Not their fault, yeah, because they do not know what extension education is, and I don’t think if there is any university around here that has a department of extension education, I think Department of Business Management and Department of Agriculture economics is covering that there. It’s

Jay Whetter  1:01:46

an essential part of all this. If we don’t, there’s no point in doing all this research unless we extend it. Otherwise. What’s the point?

Toban Dyck  1:01:54

But, but we, we do have to go, yeah, like, right now, yeah, right. Okay. So

Jay Whetter  1:01:58

I just wanted to, is there one last 30 seconds, thing, Dil G that you wanted to say that we

Diljeet Brar  1:02:08

discussed more than I had Okay, something important, a few things, for example, public versus Private extension. I think strengthening public extension is needed, right? If you want me to sum up in 30 seconds, I would say, Let’s connect our next generation with the land and nature that would make our future brighter.

Toban Dyck  1:02:40

We appreciate this. Dil G, it was a fantastic conversation. We could talk, I’m sure, for another few hours with you. This is, this is incredible. I loved it.

Jay Whetter  1:02:49

We talked about we talked about extension ideas that I’ve never heard talked

Toban Dyck  1:02:53

about before, and I don’t think our audience has ever heard of before there. This is very exciting, and we will definitely be in touch.

Diljeet Brar  1:02:59

You know what? I thank you really helped me to understand who I am, and you said you’re an extension expert. Should I trust that? Yeah, yes, you should wonderful. Yes. Thank you so much, guys, thank you. I love this time. I love this conversation. And wish you all the best for your this project. This is wonderful. Oh,

Toban Dyck  1:03:21

thank you so much. Thank you. Are

Speaker 1  1:03:34

you ready? Oh, yeah, yeah, we did okay,

Toban Dyck  1:03:38

we should. You should, actually, how you should do that?

Jay Whetter  1:03:40

I put it away. Oh, yeah. Well, that was a great conversation with DlG. I learned a lot, and

Toban Dyck  1:03:45

I got re inspired to put together plays and poems and oh, you know one thing he didn’t talk about that he wanted to talk about,

Jay Whetter  1:03:56

what? What do you call them? Science? Cyan tunes. Yeah, Cyan tunes, right. So before we had did the podcast recording, we chatted about some of the things that Diljit wanted to talk about. And he mentioned these science tunes, which are like cartoon drawings of science scenarios. Yeah,

Toban Dyck  1:04:10

almost kind of intuitive, what you’d expect from the merging of those two words, but, but we didn’t, we didn’t get to it and I but yeah, I just feel like, like, even when he he was talking about, not even, but when he was talking about extension education and talking about taking, like photography and communications and what were Some, there was, like, social sciences involved in this kind of extension education, which I thought was brilliant. And I think, yeah, I’d love to, I’d love to be a part of something that creates a package like that, and that’s

Jay Whetter  1:04:54

so important to be able to communicate what you’re working on, like this, this notion that extension is separate from. Science,

Toban Dyck  1:05:00

yeah, or separate from even, like, like, photography, or these other, these other, right? But all the agronomists that I know have to do all the time, but yet, that’s not part of that education formally,

Jay Whetter  1:05:14

yeah, which, yeah, the whole C CAA, CCA, right? The CCA program could have CEU credits in an extension skills, photography, yeah, and

Toban Dyck  1:05:27

then all the other, I mean, yeah, he mentioned, mentioned a few things, but, yeah, I found that quite inspiring. Yeah.

Jay Whetter  1:05:38

And are we going to do a play it, you

Toban Dyck  1:05:41

know, like, like, like, anything else, well, like, with, you know, some of our birth, some birth forest group projects, like we’ve, yeah, I think you just got to do it. And I think as much as it would be terrifying, like, I think, like, even though, even the play that you described, of, like, the the caterpillars, or the, yeah, like to take a super simple message, keep it simple and just visualize it like, who’s gonna forget about that? Nobody, a

Jay Whetter  1:06:09

bunch of little babies and grasshoppers

Toban Dyck  1:06:14

spraying them with water. It reminds me of like being a kid and going to going to church, and like the, you know, they did the church, like plays and stuff. All the kids are up, and they’re all kind of hard to wrangle these grasshoppers,

Jay Whetter  1:06:27

but it was really inspiring. I said at the end that he left me with a whole bunch of new ideas, and hopefully everyone else who listens, even if you don’t do those exact things, it gets the wheels turning. That maybe all of the the practice, the extension practices that we’ve used in the past, there are lots of others that we probably haven’t even thought of yet. Yeah,

Toban Dyck  1:06:47

it kind of breaks it breaks it open. Yeah, yeah. It almost gives, hopefully, it gives the listener license to think about extension in ways that they may have wanted to before or didn’t even know were possible? Yeah, I like that.

Jay Whetter  1:07:04

That’s why we’re doing this, and that’s why we’re doing this. We’re the extensionists. We are. I’m Jay wetter, I’m Toban Dyck, till next time, thanks for listening.

Toban Dyck  1:07:16

Are you curious about what Jay and I get up to behind the scenes at the extensionist? The

Jay Whetter  1:07:20

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Toban Dyck  1:07:28

and important updates. You’re never going to miss an episode again. Please

Jay Whetter  1:07:31

sign up at the extensionist.com this has been a burr forest group production. We also want to thank the people you don’t see we’re

Toban Dyck  1:07:45

here. We’re chatting away with our guests, but there’s tons of people who work behind the scenes to make this podcast happen. Brian Sanchez, our director, Ashley Robinson, is the coordinator, and Abby wall is our producer and editor. You