I ended up working in something that is utterly unrelated to what I studied. Nevertheless, I think it has helped, because, as the saying goes, knowledge doesn’t take up space. Plus, Global Studies helps you change your view of how you do things; rather than giving you specific knowledge, it helps you take a broader view of everything and, ultimately, that is something you can apply in any trade. 

I’d already started to realize it when I was studying in Barcelona: I didn’t like living in the city, I didn’t like the impersonal atmosphere, the noise, the frenetic pace of life, etc. But it wasn’t until Covid-19 hit that I finally made the decision to stay here, in Oliana. It had always been an option, but I had never been sure of it. Then, my godfather died of Covid-19 and my father had to quarantine for a long time. Overnight, they called me and told me I had to come home because they only had one worker left for 200 cows. I didn’t think twice. I went back, and I’ve been here ever since.

I was the only person in my graduating class from the province of Lleida and the only person who worked in agriculture. That sparked some interesting discussions in class. Someone would say that the European Union was allocating too much money to the agriculture policy and that farmers shouldn’t be allowed to live off of subsidies. Then I would explain that what they didn’t understand was that those subsidies were not for me, but to bring down the cost of what I produce so that, when they went to buy it at the supermarket, they could do so for an affordable price, as, otherwise, that wouldn’t be possible. But there were also very healthy debates in the university canteen about veganism and how I would bring a lunch box with eggs from my happy hens. At first, I could not understand how they could think that soy and seitan sausages from South America were more sustainable than my eggs; but, over the years, you reflect on things and you see that there is real pressure from the vegan and vegetarian community and, also, that we cannot place the blame on individuals for their food choices, because we’re dealing with a structural problem and none of us alone is going to solve it. 

For one thing, I think there’s something about people from the rural world – or, at least, that was my case – where it is part of your identity. I was ‘Laia, the one with the cows’. I was really pleased to see how my closest friends came to understand a lot of things and how, as a result of having met me and having come out here a few times, they had seen that we really aren’t the “monsters” that society seems to want to think we are. But there are also a lot of people who continue to think that to live like this is to eschew progress and fail to take advantage of technology, that it is to live in the Stone Age.

I get up quite early and go to the farm. We divide up the daily chores between me, my father and a couple of other workers. Usually, I deal with the highest-priority chores: giving milk to the calves, coming out to see the cows that are grazing, checking to see if they’re all right, if any of them has calved, if the electric wire is still live, bringing food, etc. We have two farms and you have to bring food to the one that’s farther away, for example. There is also a lot of paperwork, a lot of commuting, because the cooperative is in Seu, and that’s where all the purchases and management have to be done; it’s a 40 minute drive away. Really, what’s great about this job is that it is not at all routine. You get to the farm and, sure, there is a series of tasks you have to do every day, but otherwise there’s always some emergency or something that has to be dealt with that makes it different.

Right now, we have about a hundred head of cows in lactation. We are members of the Cadí cooperative. Every day of the year, all 365 days, they come to pick up the milk and bring it to Seu, where they have the factory, and they turn it into butter, cheese, cream... We also take care of the mothers and calves, and we fatten them up to sell them for meat. 

Yes, and that is hard, but I think that, within the sector, I am fairly lucky, since, between the two of us, my father and I organize things very well. Of course, we haven’t had a family vacation for quite a while, as someone always has to stay here. Plus, we like to supply our own fodder, grown in our fields, as much as possible, and that entails more work. But it pays off in the end, financially and morally. Being able to feed your cattle with food from your own farm, where you know how it was grown, that you haven’t treated it with chemicals, etc. 

Salvador Vergés (an MP from the party Junts per Catalunya) recently gave a speech in Parliament including an incredibly long list of all the permits and requirements applicable to livestock farms. It is inhumane! There is so much scrutiny. I can’t take a step without someone stepping in to monitor me. But, obviously, you can’t just come in, sow some seeds, and that’s it. It’s technically and organizationally stimulating, like any other sector, and a very large part of the work is financial management. 

Farm work is a heavily masculinized sector. It is also a sector with a lot of family structure behind it. This means that many family-run farms do not have the job stability you might find at a company, and there is a lot of extra work that isn’t paid. That makes it complicated, especially for a lot of women, who, for many years, have been helping behind the scenes without any sort of public presence or recognition for their work, often without any direct income and, therefore, no capacity for independence, and also without paying into social security, meaning they have no pension to retire on. Things have changed a bit now: the Catalan government has set up some grants where you receive more money if you are a woman, to help you sustain your agricultural activity. 

The reality is that there are now more women who pay into social security and are able to maintain ownership of the land, and that empowers them a little, but it is not enough. Very few women want to go into farming. They do not feel it is a job for them, because that is what society or their own families have told them. 

Things are changing, but a lot remains to be done. For example, people have to start changing and stop making certain remarks in public, stop doubting you. We need to encourage affirmative action in cooperative or stockbreeding association quotas because, otherwise, it is impossible to make our voice heard. 

I think the time that struck me the most was at the town butcher’s shop. This was when only one person could go in at a time, so I was waiting outside, but I could hear what they were saying inside. And this man – I don’t know who he was, but he knew me – was talking about me to the butcher, and he said, ‘Well, we’ll see what happens once her father is gone, how she won’t be able to run it.’ When you are a woman, people are more likely to ask, ‘Are you sure, young lady?’ with that condescending tone. It is very hard work, but it is hard for men, as well. Today, anyone in good physical condition can do it; there is no impediment. 

Some people have a bucolic view of it; others think we live in the Stone Age. When I was at UPF, people would ask me if we had WiFi at home. Some country folk might be amused by that, but I found it insulting. I am a member of the Unió de Pagesos trade union, and I am tired of going to meetings with politicians who promise you all sorts of things and then fail to deliver. It eventually wears you down on a personal level, until you’re too tired to fight against territorial inequality. All those remarks strike a chord with your context and they sap your energy. You start to get tired of paying the same taxes without having the same rights. 

That bucolic vision people have often clashes with our way of life and how we understand the world. We are not comfortable with moralistic attitudes about how to treat animals coming from people who have never cared for one. People tell you you’re not doing it right, but they don’t offer a better alternative. 

I consider myself someone with a deep interest in protecting the environment, but I am also deeply interested in making sure that everyone in Catalonia can eat food produced here, and that means
semi-intensive production. I’m not talking about fully intensive production, but we cannot feed seven and a half million people with four happy chickens; it’s just not realistic. We have to produce with guarantees of animal welfare, but there also has to be a certain volume of stabled livestock in order to have natural fertilizer, which then has to be used in the proper measure in the fields; otherwise, we’ll have to continue using chemical fertilizers. 

In Unió de Pagesos, I am on the dairy cows committee and the youth committee, which is where I am most active. We work on generational renewal at farms. We try to educate people so they understand that this is a worthy and necessary profession, and we organize activities to call for improvements to small inconsistencies in the law or, especially, with regard to the grants the government is giving to young farmers so they can start an agricultural activity.

It’s a serious problem, and I think it is a bigger threat in Catalonia than in other places where you can make a better living with stockbreeding and agriculture. It is very hard here for reasons having to do with the market and production costs. 

I think it has to be addressed with education, by trying to make people understand that this is a beautiful occupation and, moreover, that it is a great job if you want to feel useful for society because you are helping to feed people, whilst at the same time maintaining the land. It’s about preserving forests and life in the Pyrenees. 

Generational renewal affects more than just farms. People always forget about the economy activity we generate indirectly. For example, in this region, most of the dairy farms are members of the Cadí cooperative, which is the second or third largest employer here. If the cooperative were to decide to close its doors, or if most of the livestock farmers were, not only the cooperative workers would end up on the street. So would all the people who transport the feed and the livestock, the mechanics, the scores of business advisors who handle that part of the work for all the farms... There are a lot of people behind us in the chain. 

The biggest challenge is surviving, because we are dealing with a crisis of commodity prices coupled with a social crisis in terms of the concept people have of us. If we manage to survive – and I’m not sure we will – then we will face many other challenges. But what we have to do is convince people and politicians that we are essential. In this regard, there is an old saying in the country that goes: ‘You’ll need a lawyer or an architect once in your life, but you need a farmer three times a day, every day, or you won’t eat.’ 

The biggest challenge is surviving, because we are dealing with a crisis of commodity prices coupled with a social crisis in terms of the concept people have of us

I would start by having someone far more qualified than I am go to Parliament and say, ‘What were you thinking allocating I don’t know how many millions to bailing out ski resorts when here, in Oliana, if you have an emergency, it’s a 40-minute drive to get help? What were you thinking closing rural schools? What were you thinking setting the price of the public bus to Barcelona at 20 euros?’ I think it is absolutely legitimate that so many people who live out in the country are offended by the distribution of resources and the use being made of them, when the real needs of the people who live here, in the Pyrenees, are ignored. I want an affordable bus or for people from Oliana to be able to go to upper secondary school free of charge, like the people from Solsona can, and the people from Seu. No real priority is given to the basic needs of the people who live here. Plus, the government is forcing us to be increasingly more digitally competent, but our farming population is quite old, and there is a very large digital divide in our sector. They require us to send all the necessary information through a relatively complicated programme, and that’s a problem, because someone who has spent their entire life raising cows has no obligation, at the age of 60, to learn to use a really complex spreadsheet. They’re a farmer, not an economist. But the best part is that we’re obliged to send all this information digitally when there isn’t even an Internet connection in our area... There’s nothing illogical or incoherent about that! 

It would be our ruin. I think the fact that it is already a threat or that there already exists the possibility of producing protein in a laboratory will result in all these fields we see here being abandoned; everything will become woodland and, according to Marc Castellnou (inspector in the Catalan Fire Service), sooner or later, a wildfire will break out and burn down the whole Pyrenees, from one end to the other. As a society, we need to understand that farming can improve a lot and that we cannot abandon the rural world, which basically depends on the survival of agriculture and stockbreeding.

So far, I’ve focused a lot on what I’ve already gotten out of my bachelor’s and master’s degrees, and I am very grateful for that. Going forward, proposals such as the UPF Alumni seminar you mentioned or being featured in 360upf magazine help provide a platform for people with particular stories. I also think there could be potential in the Planetary Wellbeing initiative. Personally, I find it fits very well with my view of things. 

I would tell them not to think about the career opportunities, that life will take them wherever it needs to and that there is absolutely nothing wrong with acquiring knowledge and devoting a few years to education, which you will always find a way to apply later, even if you end up working in something that is worlds apart from what you studied.