One could begin about 3000 years ago, when it was natural for people in a reasonably well developed agricultural society to see a subtly tensioned connexion between the degree of wisdom spoken by the mouth, and the understanding of the meditating heart (1); the fulfilment of the principle of true community and the increase of the land (2). And one could pause there and reflect on the words of a contemporary prophet, "We are (now) far too clever to survive without wisdom." (3). But, for our purpose, a more appropriate point at which to begin to reach an understanding of the present state of communication in New Zealand farming may be the Europe of a mere one to three centuries ago. It is from the tumult of agricultural and industrial revolution then, its origin and its aftermath, that many of the attitudes of modern New Zealand farming stem. When we think at all of that era, it is often to recall names like Tull (inter-row cultivation), Coke (crop rotations), Boussingault (understanding of nitrogen's role), Blomfield (improver of permanent pasture), Bakewell (animal breeding) and so on.
