Thursday, March 28th
How does “Natural Law” teach us to take care of Mother Earth? And what is the intimate relationship between natural law and food sovereignty? The Indigenous-led food sovereignty movement has spread rapidly over the past decade. Food sovereignty is more than just returning to ancestral diets for health and wellbeing. It is also a return to natural law while honoring our responsibilities towards all life on earth. In this panel, three Indigenous women share their personal journeys to food sovereignty, what this has meant for their communities, and why food sovereignty is so much more than a movement. Moderated by Alexis Bunten. Featuring Tabitha Robin, Rowen White and Marcus Briggs-Cloud.
March 28th | 4:45 pm to 6:00 pm | Berkeley Ballroom, Residence Inn
Panelists
Tabitha Robin
Assistant Professor in the Applied Biology Program | University of British Columbia
Tabitha Robin, Ph.D. (Métis/Cree/settler ancestry), an Assistant Professor in the Applied Biology program at the University of British Columbia, earned her doctorate in Interdisciplinary Studies from the University of Manitoba, where she examined the role of food in Cree helping and healing practices. Her research includes how Indigenous knowledges can be used as food literacy; the reclamation of Indigenous seed knowledges; and factors that affect Indigenous food sovereignty.
Marcus Briggs-Cloud
Co-Director | Ekvn-Yefolecv
Marcus Briggs-Cloud (Maskoke), Ph.D., is a language revitalizer, scholar, musician and co-director of Ekvn-Yefolecv: an off-grid, climate-positive, income-sharing ecovillage comprised of Maskoke People who, after 180 years of displacement, returned to their homelands for language and cultural revitalization and ecological stewardship. A graduate of Harvard Divinity School who also has a doctorate in ecology, Marcus’ research intersects ecology, genetics, linguistics, liberation theology, and ecofeminism.
Rowen White
Director | Sierra Seeds
Rowen White, an Indigenous seed-keeper from the Mohawk community of Akwesasne and a passionate activist for Indigenous seed and food sovereignty, is the Director of Sierra Seeds, an innovative organic seed organization focusing on Indigenous seed stewardship and education. Rowen is the founder of the Indigenous Seedkeepers Network, which is committed to restoring the Indigenous Seed Commons across North America through restoring seed kinship routes.
Alexis Bunten
Co-Director, Indigeneity Program | Bioneers
Alexis Bunten, Ph.D., (Aleut/Yup’ik), Co-Director of Bioneers’ Indigeneity Program, has been a researcher, media-maker, manager, consultant, and curriculum developer for organizations including the Sealaska Heritage Institute, Alaska Native Heritage Center, and the FrameWorks Institute. She has published widely about Indigenous and environmental issues, and is the author of So, how long have you been Native?: Life as an Alaska Native Tour Guide.
8:15 pm: Film Screening: Abundance
A film about the remarkable Farmlink project
Introduction before film and Q+A following, with the film’s director Owen Dubeck and Farmlink’s Director of Sustainability, Julia DeSantis.
During the Covid epidemic and the resulting largest food crisis in a century, as food bank lines grew across the country, a group of college students stepped up to try to figure out how to help those facing hunger in their community. Their very successful small local effort inspired and motivated 600+ students from around the country to drop everything and work in remarkably creative ways to mobilize a national effort to feed millions of families and combat food waste. Within months, the project scaled up far more than anyone could have imagined, and these student activists now find themselves on the front lines of finding long-term solutions to eliminating waste in the food system and fighting hunger nationally and globally.
March 28th | 8:15 pm to 9:15 pm | Goldman Theater, Brower Center
Panelists
Owen Dubeck
Documentary Filmmaker
Owen Dubeck is a Santa Monica, CA-based avid surfer and documentary filmmaker whose films have raised $1 million+ for social causes, influenced legislation and been screened to audiences across the country. His films include: Free to Care (Audience Award at Austin Film Festival), Paperboy Love Prince Runs for Mayor and, most recently, Abundance. In the early days of the pandemic, Owen helped found and lead an initiative called The Farmlink Project that scaled from a tiny non-profit of college students into a nationally recognized movement that has delivered over 80 million meals.
Friday, March 29th
In this session, Cole Bush, of Shepherdess Land and Livestock Co.; Bre Owens, Director of Western Programs with the National Grazing Lands Coalition; and Sarah Wentzel-Fisher, of the renowned Quivira Coalition, will discuss the ways in which enlightened livestock management, particularly shepherding, can actually improve the land and soil, sequester carbon, and strengthen rural communities. They will share their experiences working in the American West, seeking to restore and protect its delicate landscapes through intelligent, cutting-edge grazing practices, as well as cultivating relationships between diverse peoples, cultures, and places. Questions they will explore will include: How can livestock contribute to building climate resilience? How can we think and act differently about the relationship between people, animals, and watersheds? How are unexpected allies critical in changing our food, fiber, and climate systems?
March 29th | 3:00 pm to 4:15 pm | Golden Bear Room, Hotel Shattuck Plaza
Panelists
Cole Bush
Owner/Operator | Shepherdess Land and Livestock Co.
Brittany Cole Bush (aka “Cole”), an entrepreneur, educator, and consultant in the fields of climate-smart agriculture, land stewardship, and prescribed grazing with sheep and goats, is the owner/operator of Shepherdess Land and Livestock Co. With over a decade of experience, Cole has developed and managed the treatment of thousands of acres on private and public lands, (including the East Bay Regional Parks District) using carefully managed grazing as an ecosystem service for ecological enhancement and fire hazard reduction throughout California. She is also dedicated to training new entrepreneurs and practitioners in the field of land and livestock through a vocational training and workforce development program, the Grazing School of the West.
Sarah Wentzel-Fisher
Executive Director | Quivira Coalition
Sarah Wentzel-Fisher, Executive Director of the Quivira Coalition, a Santa-Fe, NM-based nonprofit seeking to foster resilience on working lands, has been involved in food and agriculture planning for 10+ years with a focus on supporting young and beginning farmers and ranchers. The Editor of Edible Santa Fe from 2011 to 2017 and an organizer for the National Young Farmers Coalition from 2013 to 2015, she currently serves on the boards of the Southwest Grass-fed Livestock Alliance and the Rocky Mountain Farmers Union. A farmer herself, she is a committed champion of resilient and regenerative agriculture.
Bre Owens
Director of Western Programs | National Grazing Lands Coalition
Bre Owens, a Los Molinos, CA-based rancher with an academic background in rangeland ecology and livestock production, is the Director of Western Programs with the National Grazing Lands Coalition, where she works with livestock producers and working lands conservation partners in all the western states. Bre also serves as board chair of both the CA Rangeland Conservation Coalition and Holistic Management International, and as the President of the Cal-Pac Section of the Society for Range Management.
Saturday, March 30th
Hosted by the Ecology Center
Since the “Back to the Land” movement and the Free Breakfast Program of the Black Panther Party for Self Defense in the 1960s and 70s, food-based movements have continued to evolve and chart new territory thanks to dedicated generations of leaders. In this session, some visionary contemporary food equity luminaries will discuss their projects and analyses and share their experiences and insights. We will hear about how to forge structural solutions for building systemic change through pilot programs, community building, and political advocacy; learn about innovations and successes in production and distribution at local and national scales; and come away with an overarching picture of how food activists are collaborating to build a healthy, sustainable, and just food system for all. We will leave feeling informed, activated, and inspired to make change. Moderated/hosted by Martin Bourque, Executive Director, Ecology Center. With: Minni Forman, Food and Farming Director, Ecology Center; Xavier Morales, Executive Director of The Praxis Project; Miguel Villarreal, Interim Co-Executive Director, National Farm to School Network.
March 30th | 4:45 pm to 6:00 pm | Magnes Museum
Panelists
Minni Forman
Food and Farming Program Director | Ecology Center
Minni Forman, MBA, who leads efforts to support small farm-direct retail channels in California as the Food and Farming Program Director for Berkeley’s Ecology Center, was born in a subsistence farming family in Belize and went on to dedicate her career to the development and growth of resilient and equitable food systems. Minni previously co-founded an urban farm Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program in Detroit and implemented a trade model that directly connects smallholder Indigenous cacao farmers in Belize to fine chocolate markets across the globe.
Xavier Morales
Executive Director | The Praxis Project
Xavier Morales, Ph.D., MRP, with academic backgrounds in Regional and Urban Planning, Community Development, and Environmental Sciences, is Executive Director of The Praxis Project, a national non-profit dedicated to accompanying base-building community organizations to transform systems, structures, policies, and practices toward improved health, equity, and racial justice.
Miguel Villarreal
Interim Co-Executive Director | National Farm to School Network
Miguel Villarreal, MBA, Interim Co-Executive Director for the National Farm to School Network, was born into a family that followed work in the fields for the first seventeen years of his life. He subsequently worked as a School Food Service Director for 30+ years and was a renowned innovator in bringing locally-grown, plant-based meals to schools. He worked with many partners, including a wide range of educational institutions, community stakeholders, health-oriented organizations, farmers, local and national policy makers, state and national groups, and foundations to achieve a high degree of success in creating sustainable, equitable, nutrition and wellness environments in schools and communities. He serves on numerous local, state and national boards of organizations focused on improving the “culture of wellness” in communities.
Martin Bourque
Executive Director | Ecology Center
Martin Bourque, the Executive Director of the Ecology Center in Berkeley since 2000, has led that cutting-edge non-profit to become a high-impact engine for change locally, regionally and nationally, helping move progressive agendas in such domains as transparency in plastic recycling, pollution reduction, food and farming, access and equity, consumerism, and zero waste.
