February 19th, 2010 By Rich Kerstetter
One almost expected to see a Monsanto executive among the honored guests and presenters at the 19th annual Farming for the Future Conference held Feb. 4 – 6 in State College, Pa. After all, the St. Louis-based agri-giant was recently named “Company of the Year” by Forbes magazine. And in its well-funded advertising campaign that strategically targets such media outlets as National Public Radio, Monsanto proclaims itself to be the very champion of sustainability.
While many of the more than 2,200 attendees of the Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture’s yearly gathering would have gladly entertained a dialogue with a Monsanto representative, it’s safe to say they view the conference’s central concept in a quite different light. Read More
Tags: conference, definition, PASA, sustainability, sustainable agriculture
January 29th, 2010 By Antonio Roman-Alcalá
As I understand it, the Ecological Farming Association’s annual EcoFarm conference has been held at the Asilomar Conference Grounds for 20 of its 30 years (the unofficial conference motto this year was “Still Dirty at 30″). With that long of a commitment to this beach-side central coast location, you’d think that there was a good thing going. However, things are not always that rosy, and EcoFarm is needing some help. Read More
Tags: Aramark, conference, Eco-Farm, farm gathering
September 14th, 2009 By Janine Yorio
Earlier this year, investment guru Jim Rogers predicted that within the next decade farmers will be the ones driving Lamborghinis, while stock brokers will drive tractors or taxis. His contrarian proclamation has since fueled intense investor interest in the agriculture sector. But despite this growing interest, the majority of investors have yet to discover the sector’s most promising niche: sustainable agriculture.
Today, farming uses 80 to 90% of all the water consumed in this country, along with millions of gallons of chemical pesticides, hormones and antibiotics. After food is grown, processors and retailers ship it across vast distances before it reaches consumers. The result is a tangled web of farms, runoff, oil dependency and highly-processed or unripe food laced with chemicals. Sustainable agriculture offers a healthier, more environmentally-friendly alternative.
Two measurable factors are driving growth in the sustainable agriculture sector: rising oil prices and increasing consumer demand. Traditional agriculture is highly dependent upon petrochemicals. In fact, in 2006, when fuel and fertilizer prices began to rise, USDA researchers noted that most farmers immediately began to reduce fertilizer, fuel, pesticide and herbicide usage to reduce costs. With input costs on the rise, “sustainable” practices may become synonymous with “cost-effective.” Read More
Tags: conference, investment, NewSeed Advisors, responsible business, sustainability
February 24th, 2009 By Challey Comer
We call it ‘hitting the reset button’ around the office. Each February, my sustainable farming colleagues and I count the days until we make the trek across the Delaware River and on to State College for the Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture (PASA) Farming for the Future Conference. It’s not so much that we’re not surrounded by great farm and food business owners in our own area, it’s that spending three days surrounded by over 2,000 like-minded folks from across the northeast is an annual reassurance that we’re on the right track. Read More
Tags: conference, farming, PASA
December 15th, 2008 By Annie Myers
There are few moments more powerful and thrilling for a young person than those in which we learn a skill that we want to and will use for the rest of our lives. Or those first days when we truly realistically consider our futures – just our next five years, if not more – and realize (or think very much) that we know what it is that will make us happy. Or that last second we have before feeling we are in that future, that brief moment of conviction that we have never in our lives been less prepared nor more determined. Read More
Tags: conference, stone barns, young farmers
