Looking back to my college days, there was one craze that my roommates and friends got into that I never got into. It’s called Virtual Farming, and it’s a new application on Facebook. I ran across an excellent column on this Virtual Farming by Gary Truitt at Hoosier Ag Today. While I always thought of it as some strange addiction that would more than likely eat up all my time (partly true), Truitt sees it as an educational opportunity for consumers (if the application was accurate).

Let me explain how this works. On Facebook, you can join a farming community, where you can purchase livestock, plant and harvest crops, make money, build fences and join a neighborhood. Truitt writes, There are no diseases, no deaths, no market crashes, no hail storms or droughts, and no bank foreclosures. Yet the game is engaging and, if you are not careful, rather addictive. Like farming, it can get into your blood.

This game on Facebook is one of those tools that might begin a conversation with consumers about where their foods come from; however, the livestock aren’t used for meat or milk production in this game. Truitt admits there are flaws to this system when he writes, I would like to see the game developers add some new features to the higher levels. Things like confined animal feeding, biotechnology, and conservation tillage. These are simple concepts that could be easily added to the game and would enhance the players’ understanding of agricultural issues that are very much in the news today.

To read the entire column, link to Hoosier Ag Today. And, let me know if you give this virtual farming thing a shot. I haven’t tried it yet, but I might think about joining a rural community online one of these days…