Welcome: What has happened? The history of biodynamics in seven reflections
What has happened since 1924? How has biodynamics influenced agriculture? This is the question with which we open the conference. We present the historical impact of the Koberwitz impulse in seven images:
Ueli Hurter - Transition and farms
1. Christopher Brock - research
2. Jasmin Peschke - nutrition
3. Alexander Gerber - market and brand
4 Albrecht Römer - inner work
5. Nadia El Hage - political work
6. Bruno Follador - soil and preparations
7. Alysoun Bolger - international network and BFDI
Simultaneous interpretation to English is available.
Date
1 February, 15:00-16:15
Place
Main Auditorium
Language
German | English
Ueli Hurter
Since 2010 in the leadership of the Section for Agriculture and since 2020 also on the Executive Board of the General Anthroposophical Society. Since 2019 on the Board of Directors of Weleda. Biodynamic farmer at the Ferme-Fromagerie de L'Aubier and in the management of L'Aubier until 2020. Since 2002 on the Board of the International Biodynamic Association (IBDA) and since 2021 on the Supervisory Board of the Biodynamic Federation Demeter International (BFDI).
Alexander Gerber
After an agricultural apprenticeship on a Demeter farm, Alexander Gerber studied agricultural sciences at the University of Hohenheim and earned his doctorate at the Institute for Social Sciences of Agriculture. He pioneered the methodology of transdisciplinary environmental research and designed the first cross-value chain and English-language master's degree program on organic agriculture at the University of Hohenheim. From 2003, he helped to build up the umbrella organization of the German organic sector, Bund Ökologische Lebensmittelwirtschaft, for which he served as managing director until 2013. Since 2013 he has been a board member of Demeter Germany and since 2014 vice president of the Biodynamic Federation Demeter International.
Christoper Brock
Dr. Christopher Brock has been a member of the board of Forschungsring e.V. since 2016 and research coordinator for Demeter e.V. Previously he was a member of staff at the Chair of Organic Agriculture at Justus Liebig University in Giessen for twelve years. He is the contact person for Demeter e.V. members on research issues and represents the biodynamic movement in scientific networks and research associations. With this background he works intensively on methodological and scientific-theoretical questions of biodynamic research.
Jasmin Peschke
Jasmin Peschke holds a doctorate in ecotrophology and has been working on the quality of food and natural products for over 30 years. She is responsible for the Nutrition Department at the Section for Agriculture at the Goetheanum, Dornach (Switzerland).
Albrecht Römer
Albrecht Römer has been living with his family in the Camphill village community Lehenhof at Lake Constance since 1981, was a farmer and managing director there for many years; collaboration in the education of the Free Agricultural School Lake Constance; since the end of the 1980s he has accompanied the work of the Section Agriculture as a member of the representative committee agriculture.
Nadia El Hage
Nadia El-Hage Scialabba is an ecologist who led for decades the organic programme of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. She is currently a researcher of the Swette Centre for Sustainable Food Systems (Arizona) and serves on the board of directors of the Italian Association for Biodynamic Agriculture.
Bruno Follador
Bruno Follador is an agrarian geographer trained in Biodynamic Agriculture at the Pfeiffer Center, USA. He worked as the gardner at Camphill Heartbeet, USA. He was the founder and director of the “Living Soils” project at The Nature Institute, USA. Currently, he works in Brazil as an associate researcher from The Nature Institute, is part of the teaching faculty of the Medical Anthroposophical Association of São Paulo , teaches at different Waldorf Pedagogy Seminars and conducts advisory work and courses in Latin America, Europe and the United States. The focus of his research is Goethean Science out of Anthroposophy and some of the themes he works on are: biodynamic agriculture, farm-scale composting, Pfeiffer’s Round Filter Chromatography, the 4 elements, the role of human imagination and landscape perception, the 12 senses and the 7 vital processes. He lives in Botucatu with his wife and two children.