The future is bright!

I'll let you decide what you take from that.

I started going along to Edinburgh JAC meetings at the grand old age of 13 after being persuaded to sign up to play in the national curling competition at Kirkcaldy.

I'll be honest, I had no idea what young farmers involved or what I was letting myself in for. Obviously, I'd heard my parents and their friends talking about the good old days and reminiscing about what they had got up to as youngster,s but I didn't realise just how much one organisation could do for so many people.

However 16 years later, I've been a member ever since and still try to get along whenever I can, so it must not have been too bad.

I grew up on a mixed hill farm just outside Currie, which in turn is only just outside Edinburgh - although when under the age of 17 and not yet able to drive on the roads it felt like the middle of nowhere.

As we were too close for a bus and the mile to Currie with no pavements was deemed unsafe to walk, we had to rely on Grandpa Barr driving us to school in the Shogun.

I'm not sure which school year myself and my sisters were in before we decided it was no longer 'cool' to turn up at the gates with ceilidh music blaring and asked to be dropped off a short walk away.

Being so close to Edinburgh, and with another high school only a couple of miles away, we were the only farm kids in the school and had to endure all sorts of what we now call banter.

Weekends were spent helping dad with sheep, going round the hill on either a horse or quad bike or occasionally having a friend to stay and showing them how to do those things.

It was only when I started going along to young farmers and mixing with like-minded people that I started coming out of my shell.

Hockey, bowling, speech making, cabaret, arts and crafts, stock judging, rallies, the list goes on - you name it, we tried our hand at everything.

It was great meeting new people from all over Scotland and becoming closer friends with those whom I had known for years through our parents. I even met my soon-to-be husband through young farmers, as have so many others.

Although still keen on helping on the farm, my day job now is working with NFU Scotland as regional manager for the Lothians and Borders and it wasn't until applying for the role in 2013 that I realised just how much my experience within young farmers has helped in different aspects of my life.

Taking on office bearer roles at a young age was a necessity in our club as membership numbers were low for a while. At the time, it felt like huge amounts of work but now I wouldn't change it for the world.

As secretary you learn to organise meetings, write minutes and letters, keep membership records up to date and liaise with the national office over competition entries plus much, much more.

As chairman you have to take charge of a meeting, thank speakers and guests and make sure everyone gets a chance to speak.

All of those skills are relevant to my current job. Speech making competitions have helped my confidence in addressing large groups of people and I now think nothing of introducing events, speaking on behalf of our members, discussing issues with politicians and, more often than I'd like to, shouting at farmers to sit down and get a meeting started.

Being a member of a young farmers club also teaches you to be a bit thrifty when it comes to organising events. When you're spending your members' money you think twice about how much things cost - it's no different now.

When I started working for NFU Scotland it amazed me how few young people came along to meetings, especially when everything that is being discussed and decided upon today is going to affect their businesses in the future.

Not everyone agrees with every decision that is made by the union but I, for one, would rather be at the table putting my views forward, even if it is just so that I am justified in complaining about the decisions later on.

With this in mind, I volunteered to take on an observer role on SAYFC's newly reformed Agri-Affairs committee to hear their views and see how the two organisations could work together better.

I've been really impressed with some of the events the committee has organised and the level of policy awareness some of these young people have so, hopefully, once they are like me and getting to the top end of the age scale for young farmers, they will consider coming along to some NFUS events.

I have a huge passion for the agricultural industry and I believe the future is bright. Working with farmers, helping them with queries and being able to make a positive difference to someone's business is what drives me.

Having made lifelong friends through being a member of SAYFC, I hope to see this great organisation going from strength to strength so that many other young people like myself can get lots out of it.