Back to the Midwest Women in Agriculture conference, our lunch speaker on the last day was Jane Ade Stevens of the Indiana Soybean Alliance. She talked about what's "hot" in agriculture. It turns out, what's new, hip, and fly is communication. Watch me try to curb my excitement while someone talks about two of my favorite things (communication and agriculture, in case you didn't know) in the same sitting!

Jane issued a challenge to everyone in the room: In the next year, she wants everyone to get to know one local policy maker by name. Just one, but make it a good connection.

The issue is this: agriculture isn't going away. Neither is urban sprawl. This combination means agriculturally uneducated people will continue moving into agricultural territory. As we've seen repeatedly in the recent past, once urbanites get there, they're probably going to try to oust the farmers. Sometimes it's greed and selfishness, but more often it's stereotypes and ignorance.

Developing relationships and opening lines of communication are the only ways for the people who are disconnected to agriculture to understand agricultural practices and appreciate what this industry contributes to the community. These communication lines are better off initiated by the farmers—much to their collective dismay—because proactive beats reactive in nearly every hand.

What are you passionate about? Think about your cause—an industry, charity, or issue that you feel strongly about—and think about how you can better communicate it to your community citizens and leaders. Get to know one local policy maker by name. Learn about them on a professional and a personal level. Open or strengthen your lines of communication, and challenge everyone you know to do the same. Look back in a year, and see how far your cause has come. I can only hope the women eating lunch with me that day will do the same.