NAAJ Column Winners - 2023
Category description: Entries in this category allow the writer to express personal observations, humor or feelings on a topic in what may be considered a conversation with readers. Note: ONE column is submitted as a single entry.
Number of entries: 28
Comments about the competition: The quality of the entries was generally high. The people who read the works of these columnists are well served by the writers’ research, clear writing and personal observations. It was hard to pick winners, but I gave the edge to columns that addressed issues in the news and that took well-reasoned personal positions.
Judge: Patricia McNeely — D’Arce McMillan is a freelance writer retired from Western Producer after 20 years as markets editor, columnist and member of editorial board.
FIRST PLACE — Dave Dickey, Investigate Midwest
It’s time to put an end to tractor dealer embedded software license agreements— 7/27//2022
Judge’s comments: Fantastic column. The writer applies research, sharp writing and appropriate outrage to an important issue. The language is conversational, colloquial and at times amusing. It is an easy read yet still delivers a lot of information. The column quickly captures the reader’s attention by referring to John Deere’s famous tag line and then uses the same words to get to the heart of the unfairness of the company’s software license agreements. And although it is clear where the writer stands on this issue, he is fair to John Deere, including direct quotes from its technology officer outlining its position. This column is personal because the writer takes a stand. But it is not only personal opinion. The writer lays out how he came to his conclusion by quoting from a Federal Trade Commission ruling and claims from a farm involved in a class action lawsuit. This was the last of the 28 column entries that I read and I was not enthusiastic when I saw the headline promising something about tractor dealer embedded software license agreements. But as soon as I started reading the copy it was clear this was a winning opinion piece about the hot and controversial “right to repair” issue. Well done!
SECOND PLACE — Laura Rance, The (Winnipeg) Free Press
Tractors in the convoy may send bad message — 2/12/2022
Judge’s comments: Personal, succinct, reasoned, sharply written — what more could you want in a column? This writer took a bold position because a sizeable portion of farmers supported the gist of the Ottawa protest, if not all, of its often confused, “fluid” set of demands. But she backs up her position with a clear, logical argument: that including tractors in the protest helps shape how non-farmers perceive farmers and the unavoidable perception is that farmers think those with the biggest rigs or the loudest horns should make the rules. She notes the trucking industry distanced itself from the protest and suggests farm groups should also do so. Good overview of all the ramifications of a port strike would have through the supply chain.
THIRD PLACE — Michael Grunwald, Canary Media
You think the energy problem is hard? Meet the food climate challenge — 3/21/2022
Judge’s comments: The writer sets up the peculiar and daunting challenge facing agriculture: how to slash its output of greenhouse gases while simultaneously greatly expanding output even as climate change makes food production more difficult. The column is built on the foundational belief that human-caused climate change is real and a threat to humanity. So there is a segment of the population that would reject the column even before reading it. But if your worldview accepts that climate change is real, there is much to learn and consider as you read this column. He provides a lot of statistics to illustrates the scale of the problem, but does so in a way to make them understandable. He recognizes that the scale of the problem is so gloomy that it could leave the reader with a feeling of helplessness. To address that, he outlines technologies, government policies and personal actions that are pieces of the solution, providing hope. The columnist reveals his personal interest, drawing attention to instances where he saw the technology in action. He also gives his opinion about what to focus on in the future. The column is long, more than 4,000 words, but is so conversational and clear that I never felt bogged down..
HONORABLE MENTIONS
— Elaine Kub, “Kub’s Den,” Progressive Farmer/DTN
Schadenfreude: That Feeling Commodity Producers Get When Bitcoin Tanks — 1/26/2022
Judge’s comments: The writer expresses a personal feeling, but one that most readers can identify with. The writing is clear and explains technical issues in easy to understand terms. The writer’s position is not simply a feeling. By contrasting the digital currency owner’s reliance on luck and wasteful energy use to the corn grower’s labor to produce a physical product that has inherent value, she makes a reasoned argument why it is alright to abandon her “niceness” and express her Schadenfreude.
— Pamela Smith, “Editor’s Notebook”, Progressive Farmer/DTN
Title IX, 37 Words That Changed Everything — 6/23/2022
Judge’s comments An anniversary piece on how a federal act had personal benefits for the writer. By explaining the impact of the law on her adolescence the writer brings to life how momentous Title IX was to society. I’m about the same age as the writer and while I am aware of the discrimination women and girls faced in the early 1970s, I was stunned to learn how far it went in her experience, even affecting high school sports and organizations such as the Future Farmers of America. The writer nicely weaves in how she believes her experience with Title IX reminds her, and all of us, to work to eliminate injustice and exclusion.
— Urban Lehner, “An Urban’s Rural View,” Progressive Farmer/DTN
Did Organic Ag Tank Sri Lanka? – 8/1/2022
Judge’s comments: This column brings much needed sanity to an issue that blew up into an over hyped social media battle in the culture wars in the summer of 2022. This columnist writes in clear language. He lays out his research into the situation in Sri Lanka to show that its government made many errors of which the decree to move immediately to organic farming was just one. The country was falling apart due to mismanagement on many files and its collapse provides no illumination on how successful or unsuccessful a well-planned transition to organic would turn out. The writer goes on to make a good argument that future success is likely not based on an absolute commitment to conventional or organic. Rather, we need to produce more food with fewer inputs. Likely both forms of production can contribute to that goal.
— Ed White, The Western Producer
Vancouver’s grain-in-the-rain problem must be solved – 12/22/2022
Judge’s comments: A good rundown on the supreme frustration of having the country’s prime export terminals in a rainy city and not having the ability to load grain when it rains. The writer’s allusion to a farm leader from decades ago expressing exasperation over something that most would think would be solved with application of simple farmer logic is a nice, folksy, conversational way to sum up the problem. As with many seemingly intractable problems there are many facets to the issue and many interest groups involved. But as the writer points out, with some humour, humanity has solved bigger problems. He notes that the costs of the inefficiency ultimately gets handed down to the farmer, so the farmer can’t leave it up to others to solve.
Farmers, or at least their representatives, must be the catalyst to bring together the ideas and commitment to solve this issue.
— Laura Rance, The (Winnipeg) Free Press
Food giants throw support behind regenerative farming — 9/30/2022
Judge’s comments: A clearly written, conversational column probing the meaning and significant of the catch phrase of the day, “regenerative agriculture.” The phrase is everywhere, but what does it mean? As the writer notes, if everyone has their own meaning, does it mean anything at all? She wraps up with what she thinks it should mean if it is to have any lasting impact.