Traditional Agriculture and Sustainable  Living
Conference
Sustainability & Food Security for the 21st Century & Beyond
Dedicated to the memory of John Mohawk

The Native Earth Bio Culture Council (NEBCC) and the Pueblo of Tesuque are hosting the 5th annual Traditional Agriculture & Sustainable Living Conference  November 5 & 6, 2010. This years event will be held  at Northern New Mexico College, in Espanola, NM.  The Symposiums will include internationally renowned speakers as well as local and regional experts in the areas of food security and sustainable ecology and a heritage seed exchange as well as panels on youth issues in the 21^st century, food and nutrition, water issues and traditional farming, land restoration and medicinal herbs.

An important theme will be pro-active community response in support of sustainable communities, ecologies, health and indigenous spiritual practices. There is a vendors market featuring natural earth friendly products, information and services. These events, we hope, will contribute tremendously toward the goal of making the entire nation aware of the need for sustainable lifestyles  and the role of traditional agriculture.

Art contest This year’s event will include an art contest. Please bring your completed artwork to the conference. We will post it for public review and judging. The conference planning committee will make the final judging, and announce the winner at the close of the conference, Saturday evening. (Click here) for more details. (Click here) to download a registration form.

[Virtual Conference]
Where you can watch at your convenience or purchase past presentations on DVD

The public is invited and can register by clicking below.

Pre-registration is so important this year, due to the failing economy we need to have some operating capital for presenters travel expenses.

  Registration form: (click here) Register before Sept. 30th and get a free meal ticket.
  Vendors Application form: (click here) Questions: (click here) Please note this year's event will be held on the Northern New Mexico College Campus !  For a map and directions please click here. (the map )

The Host Hotel for the conference has not yet been chosen. where we will have secured a great rate by asking for the “symposium rate”.

This years keynote Speakers include;
 
Winona LaDuke, an internationally renowned activist working on issues of sustainable development, renewable energy and food systems. She lives and works on the White Earth reservation in northern Minnesota, and is a two time vice presidential candidate with Ralph Nader for the Green Party.

Oscar Olivera,  lead the struggle known as the water wars while he was executive secretary of the Cochabamba Federation of Factory Workers and spokesperson for the Coalition in Defense of Water and Life, known as La Coordinadora, he voiced demands for the water system to stay under local public control. Thousand of citizens protested the waters privatization for  weeks. The Bolivian army killed one, injured hundreds and arrested several Coalition leaders. Olivera, who had been forced into hiding, emerged to negotiate with the government.  Ultimately it was a fight over who decides control of water: is it us the people, or the international organizations.

Arty Mangan collaborated with John Mohawk and the Iroquois White Corn Project and worked with The Federation of Southern Cooperatives and African American farmers in Mississippi and Alabama.
Arty has worked with farmers and agriculture since 1978 as a partner in Live Juice, a fresh, local, organic apple juice company in Santa Cruz. In 1986, he joined Odwalla and was in charge of fruit sourcing, working with farmers in the US, Mexico and Costa Rica.
He will be speaking about Dreaming New Mexico:
Envisioning a sustainable future is the necessary first step toward realizing it. What would a regional “food-shed” economy that’s based on local jobs, healthy food, social equity, eliminating hunger and restoring the environment look like? Dreaming New Mexico a Bioneers project, has created a future Localized Green Foodshed map to facilitate transformation to a more local food system that honors and supports health and culture, while creating green jobs.

Others TBA: 

This Years Schedule (click here) to this point.

Past speakers have included:
The Late John Mohawk, a Turtle Clan Senecca farmer from the Cattaraugus Reservation (Iroquois), former editor of Akwesasne Notes, once the largest Indian publication in the US and Canada, was an assistant professor of American Studies at the State University of New York at Buffalo and associate professor director of Indigenous studies in the Center for the Americas.

Ohki Simine' Forest, a Canadian Mohawk vision holder who has lived in Chiapas, Mexico since 1986 collaborating with the indigenous Maya Zapatista people in resistance. She is founder of the spiritual and social justice organization, Red Wing Councils, and author of  Dreaming the Council Ways: True Native Teachings from the Red Lodge.

Debra Harry, Northern Paiute from Pyramid Lake, Nevada doctoral candidate at the University of Auckland, School of Education, Executive Director of the Indigenous Peoples Council on Biocolonization (IPCB) and producer of the documentary film “The Leach and the Earthworm” which examines the globalized hunt for genes within indigenous territories and people. 

Clayton Thomas Muller, Mathais Colomb Cree Nation (Pukatowegan) in Northern Manitoba, Canada, co-founder of the Aboriginal Youth with Initiative (AYII) and the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs Youth Council, architect behind and national spokesperson for the National Assembly of First Nations National Youth Advisory Council.

 Martin Bourque,   Martin Bourque is the Executive Director of the Ecology Center in Berkeley CA. Martin has been instrumental in bringing the concept and practice of Zero Waste to the vanguard of the waste and consumerism movement, and has forwarded important sustainable food and farming efforts.  He served as the Sustainable Agriculture Program Director at the Institute for Food and Development Policy (Food First) where he worked on building international exchanges around food, farming, and hunger issues in the US, Latin America, and South East Asia.

Thomas Allen Linzey, Esq., independent candidate for Pennsylvania State Attorney General, co-founder of the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund, cum laude graduate of Widener University School of Law in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, three time recipient of the Schools' Public Interest Law Award and a 2004 recipient of the Pennsylvania Farmers Union's Golden Triangle Legislative Award.

Winona LaDuke, an Anishinaabekwe (Ojibwe) of the Mississippi band Anishinabeg who lives and works on the White Earth reservations. She is program director of the Honor the Earth Fund, she works as a national level advocate to raise public support and create funding for frontline native environmental groups. She was a Green Party vice presidential  in 1996 and 2000 national elections and is the founding director for the White Earth Land Recovery project.

The International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers, THE INTERNATIONAL COUNCIL OF THIRTEEN INDIGENOUS GRANDMOTHERS, represent a global alliance of prayer, education and healing for our Mother Earth, all Her inhabitants, all the children, and for the next seven generations to come.

Galen D. Knight, PhD co-discoverer of vitaletheine. The Discovery of the vitaletheine modulators he has ushered in a new understanding of what causes cancer and other "dys"eases, and of the environmental remediation, nutrition, and immune support needed to make all four leading causes of agony and death in the "US" simply go away.

Percy Schmeiser  Schmeiser has felt the sting of Monsanto's long legal arm the company took the 68-year-old farmer to court, claiming he illegally planted the firm's canola without paying a $37-per-hectare fee for the privilege. Unlike scores of similarly accused North American farmers who have reached out-of-court settlements with Monsanto, Schmeiser fought back. The landmark case that went before the Federal Court of Canada, has attracted international attention because it could help determine how much control a handful of powerful biotech companies can exert over farmers. (Excerpt from Macleans Magazine, May 17, 1999, article by Mark Nichols) 

Paul Stamets  Paul Stamets discussed the evolution of mushrooms in ecosystems and how fungi can help heal environments.
Paul Stamets has been a dedicated mycologist for over thirty years. Over this time, he has discovered and coauthored four new species of mushrooms, and pioneered countless techniques in the field of edible and medicinal mushroom cultivation. He received the 1998 "Bioneers Award" from The Collective Heritage Institute, and the 1999 "Founder of a New Northwest Award" from the Pacific Rim Association of Resource Conservation and Development Councils. In 2008, Paul received the National Geographic Adventure Magazine's Green-Novator and the Argosy Foundation's E-chievement Awards.

Ben Powless Ben Powless is a 22 year old Mohawk from Six Nations in Ontario. He has been involved with the Canadian Youth Climate Coalition since its inception, working at both the national level and with the Ottawa Chapter. He is also heavily involved with the Indigenous Environmental Network, having represented them at various international events, most recently at the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization's High-Level Conference on World Food Security, Climate Change and Bioenergy. He also sits on the board of the National Council for the Canadian Environmental Network,  is on the Youth Advisory Group to the Canadian Commission for UNESCO, and is very involved in the local Aboriginal community.

Evon Peter Evon Peter is the Executive Director of Native Movement and former Chief of the Neetsaii Gwich’in from Arctic Village in northeastern Alaska. He has served as the Co-Chair of the Gwich’in Council International, on the Executive Board of the Alaska Inter-Tribal Council, and as an alternate area Vice-President to the National Congress of American Indians. Evon is also featured in the 2005 award winning feature film “Homeland: Four Portraits of Native Action,” that follows the work of four Indigenous people who are working on issues of Environmental Justice in North America.

CONTEC Consultoría Técnica Comunitaria, has been working for ten years in Rarámuri and Odami communities of the Sierra Tarahumara. They carry out ther work through a system of technological education in indigenous communities that supports economic self-sufficiency and good governance.  By working closely with their own traditional and agrarian authorities, they strengthen the autonomy and self-sufficiency of indigenous peoples.

Jefferey Smith International bestselling author Jeffrey M. Smith is a leading spokesperson on the health dangers of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs). Mr. Smith has counseled world leaders from every continent, influenced the first state laws regulating GMOs and has united leaders to support The Campaign for Healthier Eating in America, a revolutionary industry and consumer movement to remove GMOs from the natural food industry.

Drew Dellinger a spoken word poet, teacher, writer, activist and founder of Poets for Global Justice. He has inspired many people through his poetry performances and keynote talks on justice, ecology, cosmology, activism, democracy and compassion. He has spoken and performed at conferences--including Bioneers, the Green Festival and The Dream Reborn--as well as colleges, poetry venues, protests and places of worship. Dellinger has shared the stage with luminaries such as Alice Walker, Cornel West, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Danny Glover, Ani Difranco, Billy Bragg, Michael Franti, Eve Ensler, Chuck D, Paul Hawken, Van Jones and many others.

Erica Fernandez When Erica Fernandez found out that a liquefied natural gas facility was proposed for the coast of Oxnard and Malibu with a 36-inch pipeline routed through low-income neighborhoods, she was outraged. She worked in concert with the Sierra Club and Latino No an LNG group to mobilize the youth and Latino voice in protests and public meetings. She organized weekly protests at the BHP Billiton offices in Oxnard, met regularly with community members, marched through neighborhoods that would be most impacted, reached out to the media, and brought more than 250 high school students to a critical rally.
Her passionate testimony at the California State Lands Commission meeting was quoted in news articles, and helped convince the Commission to vote to deny the project. Next, she helped convince the California Coastal Commission to vote 12-0 against the project, and worked on a letter writing and phone call campaign to the Governor asking him to veto the project, just as the commissioners did. Erica's community organizing and dogged determination played a crucial role in helping her community to resist a multinational billion-dollar corporation. Fernandez is the recipient of a Brower Youth Award

Walter Gregory is an organic farmer who challenged two neighboring farmers to a worm-digging contest. He wanted to prove that farming with chemical fertilizers destroys the worms and other organisms that are nature's way of enriching the soil. "We dug 1-foot-square holes," Gregory said. "The first farmer counted three worms in his soil. The second had four. We dug mine and counted 179 worms." Gregory, 62, extols the benefits of organic farming. His circular demonstration garden covers a half-acre and is modeled after a pizza, with the different ingredients used in a pizza growing in the eight triangular wedges. North America now has five pizza gardens, including R Pizza Farm, which Gregory established seven years ago in Dow, Illinois and is open to visitors to teach about America’s food supply.

Past Display artists have included:

David Lauer Pueblos de maíz Series Pueblos de maíz is an on-going, collaborative photographic project between the photographer, David Lauer, several non-governmental organizations, indigenous communities and individuals throughout Mexico in defense of native maize.

 These Annual Symposiums for Sustainable Living and Traditional Agriculture are organized and produced by Native Earth Bio Culture Council a committee of concerned individuals and organizations that in includes the Institute of Natural and Traditional Knowledge (INTK), Traditional Native American Farmers Association (TNAFA),  Four Bridges Traveling Permaculture Institute, Tewa Women United and others.  The Symposium is made possible by generous donations from numerous community organizations and businesses and with generous financial support from the Lannan Foundation, the Pond Foundation, the Christensen Fund, USDA and individuals like you at registration.

 [Photo Gallery]       [Video Clips]     [Shop]