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8th INTERNATIONAL CSA SYMPOSIUM
decolonize your plate,
amazonize the world
Online International Symposium of Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) and Local Solidarity-based Partnerships for Agroecology (LSPA)
25.10 – 30.10.2021
Day 1
Monday 25th October 2021
Welcome Day, Let’s Meet our Hosts from Amazonia and Brazil
- 09.00 manaus
- 13.00 utc
- 15.00 cest
- 21.00 beijing
A1 – Welcome to Amazonia (plenary session)
The welcome session will allow all participants to immerse themselves in the Amazonian world, to understand where the CSA movement and its support organization, URGENCI, stand in Brazil and around the world, and to familiarize themselves with the Symposium program and methodology.
(Planned languages: EN PT FR ES ZH)
- 11.00 manaus
- 15.00 utc
- 17.00 cest
- 23.00 beijing
A2 – Celebrating 10 years of the CSA movement in Brazil
Successes and challenges in the decolonization: from a culture of costs to a culture of the Commons. Brief history of more than 10 years of CSA culture in Brazil, inspired by the construction of many CSAs as social structures that has spread to many different regions of Brazil.
(Planned languages: EN PT FR ES)
- 13.00 manaus
- 17.00 utc
- 19.00 cest
A3 – Socio-biodiversity in Brazil: traditional food and agriculture
Live interviews with Indigenous People from Brazil by food and agriculture experts, to share first hand perspectives on socio-biodiversity and traditional knowledge straight from youth leaders.
(Planned languages: EN PT FR ES)
Day 2
Tuesday 26th October 2021
Our Success Stories from the Fields and the Forest
- 09.00 manaus
- 13.00 utc
- 15.00 cest
- 21.00 beijing
S1 – Successes and Innovations – Local Food Sovereignty in Action
With Shi Yan (China), Frédéric Thériault (Canada), and Sheryll Durrant (USA).
Facilitator: Elizabeth Henderson (USA).
Farmers and their networks of eaters and community are constantly innovating as they build local food sovereignty. The lockdown and resulting disruptions to food supply chains caused by Covid-19 exposed the many weaknesses and abuses of mainstream food and agriculture. In countries around the world, medium- and small-scale local family farms staggered briefly and then sprang into action, providing food in safe ways directly to the people who desperately needed it. This plenary will highlight the successes of CSA Farms and solidarity mutual aid networks.
(Planned languages: EN PT FR ES)
- 11.00 manaus
- 15.00 utc
- 17.00 cest
- 23.00 beijing
S2 – No One Should Farm Alone: Designing Your Solidarity Enterprise with Eaters and Participatory Community Support
With Shinji Hashimoto (Japan), Florent Sebban (France), Natalie Keene (Norway) and Bryan Allan (USA).
Facilitator: Elizabeth Henderson (USA).
In starting a new CSA, farmers/organizers have the opportunity to design the project to include participation by farmers, eaters and community supporters and aligned organizations.
(Planned languages: EN, PT)
S3 – Stories from Covid-19 and policy perspectives
With Isa Alvarez (Spain), Shi Yan (China), Laurence Lewalle (Belgium), Joice Aparecido Lopes (Brazil).
Facilitated by Judith Hitchman (Ireland/France).
During the pandemic, producers in many countries found it impossible to get their food to market and access to healthy food became more difficult for consumers. Over and above the study published by URGENCI in January 2021, this workshop will revisit some of the challenges we overcame and set out perspectives for moving forward.
(Planned languages: EN, PT, FR, ES, ZH)
S4- Online management tools for Local Solidarity-based Partnerships for Agroecology and CSAs
With Thibault Guillaume-Gentil (Switzerland), Lindsey Lusher Shute (USA), Nick Weir (UK), Simon Huntley (USA), Bregje Hamelynck (Netherlands), Mikel Cordovilla Mesonero (Spain).
Facilitated by Kristina Gruber (Germany).
This workshop intends to build a bridge between food sovereignty and data sovereignty. Starting with a lightning talk to introduce sustainable digitalization and the movement behind it, followed by real life practical examples of IT infrastructure for CSAs/LSPAs. It will end with an interactive panel discussion around challenges and opportunities in the way digital tools can or cannot support sustainable agriculture in different regional contexts.
(Planned language: EN only)
- 13.00 manaus
- 17.00 utc
- 19.00 cest
P1 – Poster Session in Portuguese
The video posters are displayed on URGENCI TV.
Here is the link to the playlist of video posters in Portuguese: https://bit.ly/3vE1lAX
The video posters consist of 2 parts: a recorded speech (maximum length: 5 minutes) and a PowerPoint presentation (3 slides maximum).
(Portuguese only)
P2 – Poster Session in French
The video posters are displayed on URGENCI TV.
Here is the link to the playlist of video posters in French: https://bit.ly/3pslB7t
The video posters consist of 2 parts: a recorded speech (maximum length: 5 minutes) and a PowerPoint presentation (3 slides maximum).
(French only)
Day 3
Wednesday 27 October 2021
Our Common Vision: Building a Transformative Social Movement
- 08.00 utc
- 10.00 cest
EU 1 – 5th European Meeting of CSA Movements: Session 1, Sharing Experiences
This session, designed for European CSA practitioners, will allow participants to share their best practices of movement-building and linking with public policies at local, national and European levels.
(Planned languages: EN, FR)
- 09.00 manaus
- 13.00 utc
- 15.00 cest
- 21.00 beijing
V1 – Food Sovereignty and Solidarity Economy: key levers to decolonize the food system
25 years after the founding of the Food Sovereignty and Social Solidarity Economy Movements, we are facing greater threats than ever of corporate takeover of our food systems. The only way forward is by building stronger local/territorial food systems linked to economic change through social solidarity economy. CSA/LSPAs are a key part of this path. And the path can open up to true decolonisation of our lands, our seeds and waters, food production and consumption…
This plenary will be part of the 25 years of Food Sovereignty celebrations, and open to other social movements.
(Planned languages: EN, PT, ES, FR, ZH)
- 11.00 manaus
- 15.00 utc
- 17.00 cest
- 23.00 beijing
V2 – Together we are Stronger: Building Alliances to Challenge the Corporate Domination of our Food
Alliances are central to building both Food Sovereignty and solidarity. Especially in today’s confrontational situation between corporate interests and those of social movements. Together we have already worked on many projects and policies. How do we now move forward in this period of prolonged pandemic and corporate take-over of our food systems and institutions?
(Planned languages: EN, ES)
V3 – Ingredients and Recipes for Successful CSA Networks
Disseminating CSA is in itself a decolonizing endeavor: even though there is now a diversity of experiences available worldwide, there is no single ready-made model imposed. Networks have a key role to play in supporting CSA partnerships as living social experiments, addressing failures, collecting experience and matching complementary know-hows. This will be a cooking session: seasoned “chefs” will share the necessary ingredients and the best recipes to set up successful CSA networks.
(Planned languages: EN, FR, PT)
- 13.00 manaus
- 17.00 utc
- 19.00 cest
P4 –Poster Session in English
The video posters are displayed on URGENCI TV.
Here is the link to the playlist of video posters in English: https://bit.ly/2ZbkDlG
The video posters consist of 2 parts: a recorded speech (maximum length: 5 minutes) and a PowerPoint presentation (3 slides maximum).
(English only)
LA – Latin American Session
URGENCI members will have an opportunity to meet other members from the same corner of the world. Separate Latin American, North American, African and Asia/Oceania meetings will be organized during this time slot.
(Planned languages: ES, PT)
Day 4
Thursday 28th October 2021
Sharing our Experiences of Training, Coaching and Mentoring for CSA
- 08.00 utc
- 10.00 cest
EU2 – 5th European Meeting of CSA Movements: Session 2, Building an Action Plan for Europe
This session, designed for European CSA practitioners, will focus on creating a collective action plan for the European CSA movement for the next 2 years, until the next European meeting.
(Planned languages: EN, FR)
- 09.00 manaus
- 13.00 utc
- 15.00 cest
- 21.00 beijing
T1 – Decolonize Training
Building Alternative Curricula for the CSA Movement
This session is designed to show the diversity, strength, and richness of the international network and its assorted training and mentorship approaches.
It is also an attempt to reveal how such a wide range of approaches can be threaded together in a central space (HUB) so that the international network can learn, share, and participate more actively.
It’s also designed to reveal other, similar platforms/spaces within the network that seek to accomplish this goal.
(Planned languages: EN, PT, ES, FR, ZH)
- 11.00 manaus
- 15.00 utc
- 17.00 cest
- 23.00 beijing
T2 – How to Train CSA Members as Food Citizens?
The Food & More training program aims to support the education of “food citizens” in Europe. Partner organisations from Hungary (TVE), Czech Republic (AMPI) and Poland (FER) promote the idea of CSA and LSPA with similar socio-economical background: in these countries motivating consumers to have increased participation in organising CSA communities is a real challenge. In 2021 personal training events were organised with the same aim, to motivate consumers to become real food citizens. Thanks to the flexible approach, partners worked intensively on adaptations reflecting the special needs and target groups.
At the beginning of our online workshop, we are going to share our experiences and introduce the educational tools of Food&More; then we invite all of you for a short planning exercise. Who might the target group in your countries be? And how can we motivate them to be more involved? How we can continue this work with the support of URGENCI who else should be involved in the project?
(Planned languages: EN, PT)
T3 – Farmer-to-Farmer Workshop
The Farmer-to-Farmer workshop is a longstanding tradition in the history of URGENCI International Symposia and European Meetings. It has always been a widely appreciated place to share farmers’ perspectives on the movement. This time, the workshop will focus on “How to make my CSA farm sustainable” and on coaching / mentoring for CSA farmers.
(Planned languages: FR, EN, ES, PT)
T4 – E-Learning for CSA
The session is designed to welcome trainers of all levels of experience with e-training to discuss both URGENCI’s approach as well as the future of e-learning. The session will begin with URGENCI’s e-learning journey from physical training to e-learning during Covid, to the imagined future with blended learning. The breakout groups will then explore questions around the present and future of e-learning. This is a space to share experiences with e-learning (either as learners or facilitators) and have peer-to-peer exchange.
It is also a way to amplify the Hub and introduce a larger audience to URGENCI’s capacity to train the (e-)trainer and work on e-learning projects with partners.
(EN, PT)
- 13.00 manaus
- 17.00 utc
- 19.00 cest
T5 – CSA Brazil Training Workshop: From a Culture of Costs to a Culture of the Commons
Experience report of how CSA Brazil organized and structured a CSA
training course, with the experiences of creating CSA’s in a compendium
of lessons learned, reports, forms of governance and inspiring
philosophical principles. Presentation of the syllabus, history and
results achieved with the training courses.
(Planned languages: EN, PT, ES)
AFR – African Session
URGENCI members will have an opportunity to meet other members from the same corner of the world. Separate Latin American, North American, African and Asia/Oceania meetings will be organized during this time slot.
(Planned languages: EN, FR)
Day 5
Friday 29th October 2021
Our Challenges: Food Justice and Socio-environmental Justice
- 08.00 utc
- 11.00 cest
Med – 3rd Mediterranean Meeting of Local Solidarity-based Partnerships for Agroecology
After the 1st Mediterranean meeting of LSPA in Marseilles in 2016 and the second in Thessaloniki in 2018, representatives of LSPA and CSA initiatives around the Mediterranean Basin will gather once again, as the MedNet, e.g. the Mediterranean Network of LSPA. They will share their latest achievements, inform each other about on-going projects and come up with an action plan to be shared during the General Assembly of URGENCI (2nd-3rd November).
(Planned languages: EN, FR)
ASIA – Asian Session
URGENCI members will have an opportunity to meet other members from the same corner of the world. Separate Latin American, North American, African and Asia/Oceania meetings will be organized during various time slots.
- 09.00 manaus
- 13.00 utc
- 15.00 cest
- 21.00 beijing
D1 – Rooted & Resilient: Indigenous Strategies to Dismantle Climate Injustice
The impact of colonization and capitalism has long taken a toll on our land, people, and food systems globally. Practices and solutions rooted in local brilliance exist that dismantle these inequities. Join this dynamic conversation with local leaders as they share their solutions and amplify strategies towards a resilient future.
(Planned languages: EN, PT, ES, FR, ZH)
- 11.00 manaus
- 15.00 utc
- 17.00 cest
- 23.00 beijing
D2 – Social Inclusion: How to Make LSPA and CSA More Diversified?
Countering critics who say that organic food is just for middle- to upper-classes and ‘yuppies’, organic and agroecological CSA projects are taking the lead in reaching out to the marginalized, and to ethnically and racially diverse communities. In this workshop we’ll look at some examples and talk about how to move further forward in that direction.
(Planned languages: EN, PT, ES)
D3 – Community Supported Fisheries and Community Supported Agriculture: same struggles, similar solutions?
Small-scale fisher organizations are trying to sensitize the consumer about CSF. Unfortunately, industrial fishing industries often use the same language in their marketing strategies. In this workshop, the participants will learn how to differentiate the language of CSF and the corporate language.
(Planned languages: EN, PT, FR)
- 13.00 manaus
- 17.00 utc
- 19.00 cest
D5 – The Colonial Roots of the Modern Food System: Decolonial Thoughts and Possible Alternatives.
The modern food system – corporatist, mechanized and monoculture-based – rises and maintains itself on behalf of colonial structures. This debate intends to show from a decolonial perspective what these structures are and how they impact our lives. These are important questions if we want to build alternative systems that can really guarantee food sovereignty. This discussion will be organized by the Decolonial and Post-colonial Debaters Group, of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.
(Planned languages: EN, PT)
Day 6
Saturday 30th of October 2021
CSA Film Festival
- 09.00 manaus
- 13.00 utc
- 15.00 cest
- 21.00 beijing
F1 – Self-Paced Film Watching
There are so many farmers who tried their hand at CSA because they were inspired by a thrilling documentary movie on the topic. Let’s watch them together and share our good vibes!
Watch our selection of movies about CSA.
Here is the link to Minga, Voices of Resistance,Pauline and Damien’s first film. They traveled throughout Latin America and visited more than thirty communities, using only land and sea transport. They self-produced this documentary to guarantee a total freedom of speech to their interlocutors.
- 13.00 manaus
- 17.00 utc
- 19.00 cest
F2 – Meet the Filmmakers
During this live session, the participants will have a chance to interact with film makers during an open panel discussion.
(English only)
Speaker bio's
Annie de Temmerman Mellouki
Annie is the president of the Network of Agroecological Initiatives in Morocco (RIAM) until September 2019. She was the coordinator of this informal network from 2013 to June 2015. The strategy of the networks for the following years revolves around: disseminating best practice, sharing innovative and inspiring experiences (local economy, sustainable urban or rural agriculture, ecotourism, developing advocacy and social networking), developing collaboration with educational institutions or participating in research and development. She is involved in several associations, including the Swani Tiqa project “Vegetable gardens of confidence”, in the Rabat / Salé region since 2007. This project involves baskets of prepaid vegetables for a 6 month-season.
Ariel de Andrade Molina
Ariel de Andrade Molina is bachelor in Agroecology (UFSCar), is a specialist in Biodynamic Agriculture, MSc. in Horticulture (UNESP) and is currently a Botanist, PhD student at INPA (Amazonian National Institute of Research), researching ethnobotany, edible tropical fruits, Indigenous People’s food security and sovereignty, and landscape domestication in the Amazon rainforest. He has been engaged in the CSA movement in Brazil since 2013, is a founder-member of the CSA Brasil community association that has been spreading the movement across the country and is a member of the URGENCI International Committee. One of the founders of the first CSA in Amazonia in Manaus, he is lecturer at the CSA training course of CSA Brasil.
bregje hamelynck
Jointly with my partner we operate a Permaculture CSA garden in the North of the Netherlands. I am co-founder and member of the board of the Dutch CSA Network. Over the last three years we build a foodcoop platform together with Voedselteams, Belgium. The cooperative is called www.localfoodworks.eu.
Bryan Allan
Bryan has taken a winding road to farming, starting with a relocation from the suburbs of Chicago with a B.A. in Biology from Purdue, later earning a J.D. from Lewis & Clark College, and beginning at Zenger Farm in 2010 as an intern. Over the past 12 years, Bryan has had many roles at Zenger Farm. He now manages a farm apprentice program where 50% of graduates since 2010 currently own or manage their farms. He has created a SNAP (food stamp) program that currently provides matching funds and processes payments for 250 families and 50 CSA farms in Oregon. He created a prescription vegetables CSA program that currently feeds 300 patient families from 7 clinics with produce from 4 farms.
Cenaide Pastor Marques Lima
Indigenous native of São Gabriel da Cachoeira-AM, technician in environment, administration and public health. Indigenous Association of the Tuyuka Ethnicity Residents of São Gabriel da Cachoeira – AIETUM-SCG, financial sector and project coordinator. He is a local SUS (brazilian Public Health System) counselor.
Ceyhan Temürcü
Ceyhan is a lecturer at the Cognitive Science Department at the Middle East Technical University, Ankara.
He coordinated the Güneşköy Cooperative Organic box scheme project (2007, 2008), contributed to Ankara Ecological Life and Society Days (2013, 2014), co-moderated the DBB (“Natural Food, Conscious Nutrition”) PGS system (2009-2016), coordinatedTADYA (“Tahtacıörencik Village Ecological Living Collective”) (2013-), was responsible for the international coordination of the Building Food Communities Workshop preceding the 18th World Organic Congress (2014, Istanbul Yeditepe University), and contributes to the Mediterranean Network of Local Solidarity Partnerships for Agroecology (since 2016).
Chunhua Wang
Her nature name is called Orange. Director of Young Farmers CSA training and Children of the Earth program of Beijing Shared Harvest CSA farm. Specializing in baking.
She always loves finding out what and where really healthy food is. In March 2019, she became a team member of Children of the Earth program of Beijing Shared Harvest CSA farm. So far, she has two years of farming experience and organized many food-farming education activities such as school, parent-child and group construction. Participated in the course design and teaching arrangement of food gardens in primary schools of Beijing and Rooftop Garden projects. She was invited to participate in the international Seminar on Ecological Civilization publicity and Education and Rural Ecological Revitalization to share practical experience in food and agriculture education. Also as a guest speaker to participate in the annual Chinese CSA Conference since 2019.
Claudia Vivacqua de Figueiredo
Co-founder of CSA movement in Brazil. Co- farmer of CSA Demétria since its beginning. Supports new CSA initiatives and is a founding teacher of the CSA Training Course. Co-founder and member of CSA Brazil.
Daniel Pestana Mota
Lawyer, master in Social Sciences, graduate in Pedagogy and specialized in Educational Management. Co-farmer of CSA Demétria and CSA Flor de Mulherando in which he is also part of the core group.
Denis Carel
Is a member of Urgenci’s International Committee as well as Miramap Committee Member, France. Denis is an organic goat farmer and cheese maker to La Roquebrussanne in southern France. On the farm, he works with his son Mathias and together they manage a flock of 180 rustic goats of a local breed (la chèvre du Rove) which graze on the Mediterranean hills. The milk is processed on the farm and the cheese is delivered to an AMAP and shops in Marseilles and the department of Var. In 2001 Denis was the spokesman of « la confederation paysanne du Var», the farmer union that defends peasant agriculture. We helped create Alliance Provence, the first network of AMAP in France. At their inception, AMAP were inspired by the example of Japanese Teikei and American CSA. But also by the charter of peasant agriculture of Confédération paysanne. In 2009, several regional networks of AMAP came together to create MIRAMAP, interregional movement of AMAP, and since I am also one of those national responsible of MIRAMAP.
Diana Manrique García
Social Worker from the Industrial University of Santander, Colombia; Master in Gender and Cultural Studies from the University of Chile; Master in Public Management from the National University of Rosario, Argentina; PhD in Rural Development from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. Dedicated to academia but above all a migrant activist of our America. Traversed by multiple intersectionalities from where she articulates the struggles, resistances and re existences.
Dionísia Nagahama
Nutritionist, PhD in Public Health/USP, researcher and coordinator of the Center for Science and Technology in Food Sovereignty and Nutritional and Food Security in the Brazilian Northern Region of the National Institute of Amazon Research. Member of CONSEA/AM (Food Security Council of Amazonas), Rede PENSSAN, Slow Food, Maniva Agroecology Network and Ação da Cidadania/AM.
Elizabeth Henderson
Elizabeth Henderson farmed at Peacework Farm in Wayne County, New York, producing organically grown vegetables for the fresh market for over 30 years. She serves on the Board of the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York (NOFA-NY), and represents the NOFA Interstate Council on the Board of the Agricultural Justice Project. She also serves as Honorary President of Urgenci, the International CSA Network. Her writings on organic agriculture appear in The Natural Farmer and other publications, and she is the lead author of Sharing the Harvest: A Citizen’s Guide to Community Supported Agriculture (Chelsea Green, 2007), with a Spanish language e-book edition in 2017.
Florent Sebban
Florent Sebban is a French farmer at Ferme Sapousse in Pussay (Paris Region). Together with 2 other farmers, they produce vegetables, fruits, herbs and honey. Florent is engaged at regional (Réseau AMAP Ile de France) and national level (Miramap) with the CSA movement in France. He specifically follows advocacy campaigns promoting Citizens’ Agriculture.
Frédéric Thériault
Frédéric Thériault is one of 7 members at Tourne-Sol Co-operative Farm, in Quebec. Founded in 2005, the farm sells organic baskets to 720 local families, and seeds to customers across Canada. Frédéric holds a BSc, and a MSc in Plant Sciences and Agriculture. He has taught at the University and College level, and is the co-author of “Crop Planning for Organic Vegetable Growers”. He has been involved in Quebec’s CSA farmer network, the Réseau des Fermiers et Fermières de famille, as a volunteer farmer on the steering committee since 2008.
Gaëlle Bigler
Gaëlle Bigler is a food-sovereignty and CSA activist based in Switzerland, and is also active at the European level. She is the president of the local Swiss CSA network and an active member of the Urgenci European Kernel. She has been involved in many international projects: the European Census, the European CSA Declaration writing process, the Steering Committee of the Last European Meeting and is currently participating in the Solid Base and the Eating Craft projects.
Giulia Simula
Giulia Simula is currently completing her PhD in rural development at the Institute of Development Studies (IDS), UK. She lives between Sardinia, her native land, and Brighton, and she formally joined Urgenci in 2020 even if she has known the network for years through her work in the Civil Society Mechanism (CSM) and the International Planning Committee for Food Sovereignty (IPC).
In Sardinia she is currently working with pastoralists, and she started mapping local food producers to facilitate the interaction between urban consumers and small-scale food producers.
Isa Álvarez Vispo
Occupation: Researcher and Teacher on agroecology
In Spain, Isa is part of Zambra-Baladre. This is the Coordination of people who are in situations of social exclusion. She is also part of the Agroecology work area of Ecologistas en Acción. At global level, Isa is part of URGENCI international network, and is the current Advocacy officer. For the last 15 years she has been working with different networks of Community Supported Agriculture. Her work has ranged from training consumers and farmers on agroecology, to connecting them with one another and building new exchange models based on a food sovereignty perspective. In the last 4 years, Isa has also been doing research on food systems and public policy, focussing especially on the relationship between rural and urban areas.
Javier Rivera Laverde
Andes Region Coordinator, MAELA, Colombia. Supporter of the CSA Movement in Colombia.
Joana Ricci
Lives in Monteiro Lobato-SP and is a farmer of the CSA Comida da Terra, in São Paulo. With her family, she works with the principles of agroecology at Sítio São Benedito. A journalist by training, she traded her life in the big city for the countryside and found a new lifestyle by dedicating herself to food production.
Jocelyn Parot
Jocelyn Parot, General Secretary. Urgenci, France. Jocelyn has been working for 8 years already as the General Secretary of Urgenci. Urgenci with its allies has been instrumental in offering a solid frame for face-to-face, farmer-to-farmer and consumers’ meetings around the globe. The most extensive exchange programmes have been implemented in Europe: during the past 4 years, 55 missions and information tours have taken place in 16 different countries. CSA stakeholders have been offered the opportunity to travel abroad to share their experience: 173 international trips have been sponsored. These exchanges kept down to earth, 136 farms have been visited, and 550 local farmers met. Based on the lessons learnt from these multilateral peer-based exchanges, Jocelyn is willing to share his vision of aglobal CSA movement.
Joed Melo
Agriculture technician, farmer and co-founder of CSA Manaus at Sítio São Paulo, Iranduba/Amazonas, member of REMA (Maniva Agroecology Network).
Joel Orchard
Farmer and food systems activist, advocate for young farmers, local food and ecological agriculture. Joel has been instrumental in establishing Future Feeders : a young farmers hub, facilitating peer support and regional small scale farming networks. His other principle projects include the ”CSA Network Australia and New Zealand” and the “Northern Rivers Young Farmers Alliance”
Josefina Cendejas Guízar
Josefina is an academic from Mexico, and responsible for a new PhD programme on Solidarity Economy. She is very active in the REDCOOP cooperative movement, and in the RIPESS, the Intercontinental network of Social and Solidarity-based Economy. She has co-facilitated the first Mexican CSA meeting last year.
joshua stoll
Joshua is an Assistant Research Professor of Marine Policy in the School of Marine Sciences at the University of Maine in the United States and holds a joint position at the Maine Center for Coastal Fisheries. Joshua has been engaged in values-based seafood marketing for over a decade, working in multiple regions and across a broad spectrum of sectors. He holds a B.A. in Environmental Studies from Bates College, a Masters in Coastal Environmental Management from Duke University, and a PhD in Ecology and Environmental Sciences from the University of Maine. Prior to returning to Maine to start his current position, he was a post-doctoral fellow in the Global Economic Dynamics and the Biosphere Program at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Sweden.
Joice Aparecida Lopes
Peasant woman, from the Dandara settlement in Promissão-SP. Graduated in Land Pedagogy at UERGS, a partnership between PRONERA and MST (Landless Rural Workers Movement). Since 2013 she is president of the Cooperative of Peasant Producers and state leader of the production sector of the MST in São Paulo. Co-founder and producer of CSA
Lins/Promissão. She acts as pedagogical coordinator of the MST technical courses in Agroecology in São Paulo, in partnership with ETEC of Paraguaçu Paulista-SP and UNESP of Marília-SP.
joy daniel
Joy’s family has spent their almost all their time on farms and with farmers. His father, Alexander Daniel, is considered to be a pioneer in bringing about community based organic agriculture certification or participatory guarantee systems in the country. Joy has experience in different countries and with international organizations such as the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and GiZ in the past and has now returned to be with the farmers in central India. In the last decade, his work has been centred on small farmers and peasants in the dry land regions of Marathwada – a region unfortunately known for being the hotbed for farmer suicides in the country. Together with his colleagues in Institute for Integrated Rural Development (IIRD) and community representatives, he is involved in facilitation of Farmers Producer Organizations (FPOs), Participatory Guarantee Systems (PGS), farmer markets, farmer-consumer linkages, and improvement of the livelihoods of small farmers and peasants through micro-enterprises.
judith hitchman
is Irish, and is based mainly in France. She has 45 years international experience in interpersonal communication training and management, specializing in man- aging cultural differences within international networks of sustainable local development as well as the World Social Forum process. In recent years she has focused on working as a food sovereignty activist, and is currently president of Urgenci, the global Community Supported Agriculture network, a social movement that now represents over 2 million people. She has held the mandate as Consumer Constituency representative in the Civil Society Mechanism of the UN Committee for World Food Security and Nutrition. She is also a Board Member representing Urgenci in the intercontinental Social and Solidarity Economy network (RIPESS).
jucilane gomes
Quilombola (maroon resident) from the Black Community Senhor do Bonfim, Areia-PB, Brazil. She is 32 years old and has been a farmer since she was 10 years old. She participates in agroecological fairs in the Brejo region and works in her vegetable garden, with great pleasure in what she does! Since 2020 she is part of the CSA Parahyba network together with her partner Edilson, who is also a farmer.
kazumi kondoh
Kazumi Kondoh serves as an advisory manager of the Japan Organic Agriculture Association. She holds a Ph.D. in sociology from Washington State University, and taught at universities both in the U.S. and Japan. She currently teaches as a lecturer at Chuo University in Tokyo. She has been studying local agri-food systems and organic farming for more than ten years. In private, she enjoys growing organic vegetables at her garden. She is also a member of one of the
oldest teikei consumer groups in Japan.
kirk barlow
Kirk Barlow has worked on his organic family farm in Prince Edward Island, Canada where they raised animals and cultivated organic crops for friends in his community and for family. In 2015, he was Urgenci’s co-organizer of the 6th International CSA Conference in Beijing, China by working with Shared Harvest Farm. In 2017, he represented Urgenci at the Organic World Congress in New Delhi, India. In April 2018, he represented Urgenci again at the FAO Regional Conference for Asia Pacific in Fiji as a member of International Planning Committee. Previous to running is own enterprise out of China, he worked at KPMG as a management consultant. Now he uses his agricultural and business experiences to assist NGOs and businesses in environmental protection, as well as fishermen, smallholder farms and vendors on regulatory processes and business models to reduce reliances on middlemen and shortening supply chains in Asia.
klaus struber
Klaus is an adviser for the German type of CSA, Solawi, which stands for Solidarische Landwirtschaft, Solidarity -based Agriculture. Born in 1969, Klaus has a 20-year-long experience of biodynamic farming. He is also the founder of one of the first CSA partnerships in Germany. Since 2014, he has been an adviser in Europe for CSA with a specific focus on the following topics: founding, economy, next generation on the farm, organisational development, roadshow. In 2021, he is leading the first adviser training program in collaboration with FibL. During the webinar he stressed that there is a real need for advisors from the farmers side to help make it more professional and the time and money commitment needed for effective mentoring.
laurence lewalle
After a professional career of 11 years in the Brussels administration and a ministerial cabinet, Laurence has been working for the GASAP network for 5 years. Working in the field with producers and their eaters, but also carrying out advocacy/awareness raising missions, allows her to develop a broad vision of food systems.
leandro henrique laranjeiras
Graduate student in Defense and International Strategic Management (IRID/UFRJ). He is the general coordinator of the project Postcolonial and decolonial debates, an intern of the Sul Global magazine and research assistant of Prospective Scenarios in Space Security by the Simulations and Scenarios Laboratory of the Brazilian Navy’s Naval War College (LSC/EGN/MB).
luany ferreira marques
Graduate student in International Relations (IRID/UFRJ). She is the general coordinator of the research and extension project Postcolonial and Decolonial Debates. Researches on food sovereignty, coloniality/modernity, development and socio-environmental conflicts.
lindsey lusher shute
Lindsey Lusher Shute is CEO and co-founder of the Farm Generations Cooperative and GrownBy. Lindsey co-founded the National Young Farmers Coalition and served as executive director for ten years. Her family farm, Hearty Roots Community Farm, distributes organic produce to 1,000 CSA members in the New York City region.Researches on food sovereignty, coloniality/modernity, development and socio-environmental conflicts.
Lindsey Lusher Shute is CEO and co-founder of the Farm Generations Cooperative and GrownBy. Lindsey co-founded the National Young Farmers Coalition and served as executive director for ten years. Her family farm, Hearty Roots Community Farm, distributes organic produce to 1,000 CSA members in the New York City region.Researches on food sovereignty, coloniality/modernity, development and socio-environmental conflicts.
Lindsey Lusher Shute is CEO and co-founder of the Farm Generations Cooperative and GrownBy. Lindsey co-founded the National Young Farmers Coalition and served as executive director for ten years. Her family farm, Hearty Roots Community Farm, distributes organic produce to 1,000 CSA members in the New York City region.Researches on food sovereignty, coloniality/modernity, development and socio-environmental conflicts.
maggie cheney
Maggie Cheney, Co-Owner, Rock Steady Farm & Flowers. Maggie grew up growing food and loving food. Daughter of an organic farmer and founder of The Food Project, in Boston, she has been involved with food and farming her whole life. Currently she is a co-owner of Rock Steady Farm & Flowers, a women and queer-owned cooperative farm, rooted in social justice, growing speciality cut flowers and sustainable vegetables two hours north of New York City. Rock Steady has a 250 member CSA, as well as wholesale operation. Through creative partnerships with non-profits, majority of which work with the LGBTQ community in NYC, and offering of SNAP/EBT food stamps, 40% of the farm’s members are low-income. In the off season she works with a large non-profit, Community Access, as a consultant helping to strengthen their food justice initiatives, as well as continues to teach, now for the sixth year, at Farm School NYC, an urban agriculture training program.
maria rodrigues dos santos
Farmer at the municipality of Iperó-São Paulo, at the Bela Vista rural settlement farming agroforestry systems for CSA Coração and CSA Sorocaba, and she is stands for the MST movement (Landless Rural Workers). Maria Rodrigues is also an Agronomic Engeener by a partnership between PRONERA (Education in Agrarian Reform Program) and UFSCar.
michelle wyler
Michelle has worked in rural food systems development for 25 years. A Sustainable Agriculture graduate, former CSA farmer, and Director at the Community Alliance with Family Farmers in California, she is forever enamored by the culture of agriculture. Wyler co-founded the CSA Innovation Network (USA) to generate and facilitate idea sharing among the CSA community and to build consumer awareness of the value of CSA.
mihaela vetan
Mihaela Vețan is involved since 2007 in promoting social solidarity economy in Romania, having experience in training and project management in area of responsible consumption, fair trade and social enterprises. She graduated Political Sciences and had a Master degree in Public Policies and Advocacy.
She is the initiator of CSA in Romania (called ASAT), sustaining the development of national network to promote direct partnership between small producers and consumers.
She is interested in promoting mechanisms for social cohesion and social justice.
More info about CSA in Romania: www.asatromania.ro
mikel cordovilla mesonero
Dr. Mikel Cordovilla Mesonero is an Information Technology (IT) Engineer particularly interested in harnessing the capacity of ITs to nurture the systemic axes of essential life. He has worked to leverage technology to foster community participation in optimizing the micro realities of healthy biological relationships between global organisms, challenging the individualistic tendencies of current informatics structures. His international experience has included leading and advising sustainable community supported agriculture projects in France, Germany, Ireland and Switzerland in projects such as OpenOlitor and Sunu.
natalie keene
Natalie has a lot to share in terms of getting consumers mobilized and ready to help. Nathalie runs 3 community based non-profit CSA’s in and around Oslo, farming in two of them and managing the other. Nathalie works with a board of members on each of these farms, and all of them are organic, providing just veggies and herbs, no animals.
nathalie markiefka
Nathalie is the training coordinator at URGENCI. Her passion is to empower citizens to become active participants in the transformation of food systems. She draws her experience from working in community education and being a steering member of CSA Dublin for 8 years.
Neiliane de silva paz
School teacher, farmer and co-founder of CSA Manaus at Sítio São Paulo, Iranduba/Amazonas member of REMA (Maniva Agroecology Network).
nick weir
Nick Weir is a part-time grower on a CSA project and works with the Open Food Network to facilitate farmers and growers of all kinds to build short supply chains and resilient local food systems including community food hubs that bring together produce from multiple local suppliers onto one online shopfront.
qiana mickie
Qiana is the Executive Director of Just Food, a New York City based food justice nonprofit. Seeking to build the power, health, and wealth of historically marginalized communities through fostering solidarity economy across the New York regional food system is the focus of her work.
Qiana earned her Food Hub Management Certificate from the University of Vermont and her B.S. in Marketing from Hampton University. She serves on the Organizational Council of the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC). Qiana is an active CSA member of Rock Steady Farm & Flowers and serves on the boards of The Point CDC and the South Bronx Farmers Market.
In addition to her food system and advocacy experience, Qiana has also worked with municipal leaders across the country to help them find unique ways to improve the financial livelihoods of their residents. She worked as the Cities for Financial Empowerment Coalition (CFE) Consultant for three years and served as the Paid Sick Leave Consultant during the initial public outreach phase of the Law in 2014. Both consultancies were with the NYC Department of Consumer Affairs.
Raquel Moacara Tupinambá
Woman, indigenous, farmer, activist and defender of the rights of native peoples. Cacica (leadership) of the Surucuá village, coordinator of the Indigenous Council of the lower Tapajós river – CITUPI. Biologist, master in Botany and doctoral candidate in Social Anthropology at UnB.
Saad dagher
Is an agronomist and environmentalist specialized in agro-ecology with 25 years of experience. He is also a yoga teacher, agro-ecological farmer and beekeeper. He recently established his own agro-ecological farm (The Humanistic Farm). Dagher is the person who introduced Palestine to agroecology 15 years ago. He worked hardly to convert the first Palestinian village into an eco-village in the West Bank of Palestine – the village of Farkha and now working to bring this concept to another villages. He is the cofounder of The Palestinian Agro-ecological Forum (PAF) – a Palestinian forum to promote agro-ecology and to support the direct relationship between producers and consumers. Active in the field of nature restoration and water retention landscape. Was the director general of the Arab Agronomist Association (a local Palestinian NGO), when he was able to make agro-ecology the main goal for the association.
Samuel Holder
Samuel Holder is the Pedagogical Designer at URGENCI. He is responsible for developing and designing the online and blended learning approaches within URGENCI’s broader training strategy. He has a long history in teaching, education, and research and is completing his PhD in International Law at Keele University.
Sergio gwiri
Indigenous from theGuarani-Kaiowá people – MS/Brazil. Born in the Panambi tekoha. Indigenous farmer and has a degree in Philosophy and a Master in Social Anthropology from UFPE. He lives in Chã de Capoeira, rural area of Paudalho, PE, where he animates and coordinates the CSA Yvy Porã. Defender of traditional cosmo-agricultural knowledge systems and of sacred seeds and ancestral techniques of native forestry systems.
Shi yan
Shi Yan, the executive director of Shared Harvest (Beijing) Ecological Agriculture Service Ltd, founded China’s very first CSA Farm in China, growing and distributing organic vegetables to city consumers and renting plots of land to city folk interested in getting their hands dirty. Since then, 1000 similar CSA farms have opened across the country. She has been inspiring a healthier and more sustainable way to feed China. She is a pioneering force and active promoter behind the Chinese organic Community-Supported Agriculture (CSA) movement. She is now the vice president of International CSA Network (URGENCI), and selected as one of Young Global Leaders in 2016 by World Economic Forum, one of 20 young people who is under 40 years old and influences our global food system by Food Tank. The Beijinger selected her as one of the 20 most interesting people in Beijing in 2013.
shinji Hashimoto
Shinji was born in 1961, Hiroshima. Moved to a rural area and joined a Teikei farmer’ s group at Ichijima Hyogo prefecture where he started organic farming. Now grows a variety of vegetables and keeps layers for consumer members.
Shinji is a board member of Japan Organic Agriculture Association, Co-Chairman of West Japan Agroecology Association. He is a former coordinator of IFOAM Asia and a former member of URGENCI Board.
simon huntley
Simon Huntley has worked at the intersection of agriculture, food and technology since 2006. He is the Founder/CEO of Harvie, a service that provides home delivery of “groceries you can feel good about” to over 1700 members in the Pittsburgh area each week, connecting them with high quality, locally and regionally produced food. His passion is building a more resilient local food system, supporting small farm viability, and making it easier for consumers to eat top notch local food.
simon Todzro
A genuine (organic) globetrotter, Simon Todzro A Komi, from Togo, has been part of various organic farmers’ training programmes in Europe all through the eighties and nineties. This includes a 2-year-long training program in Switzerland, with Helvetas, and long training or working periods in France, Germany and the Netherlands. Simon is trying to pass his knowledge and his experience in organic production techniques to younger producers in his home country. He has created several incubators to get young farmers started.
Suzy Russell
Suzy is the Coordinator of the Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) Network UK. She is passionate about local food and local communities and has worked in environmental and arts-based community development for over 20 years. Suzy gave an overview of the CSA UK network membership program which caters for different levels and offers tailored support for farmers and spoke about their online activities during the pandemic.
Tanguy Cagnin
Tanguy Cagnin is responsible for the Mediterranean Basin with Terre et Humanisme, who support peasant farmers in their transition to agroecology. Terre et Humanisme has helped build the Mediterranean network of Local Solidarity Partnerships between producers and consumers for agroecology.
Thabitta mentta
Agroecology student at IFAM (Federal Instute of Amazonas), member of the Slow Food Community for the Amazon Food Legacy, Maniva Agroecology Network and CSA Manaus, OPAC Maniva technician (Participative Body for the Accreditation of Organic Conformity).
thibault guillaume-gentil
Thibaud Guillaume-Gentil is part of the comity and a member of the Rage de Vert Swiss ACP and is developing the ACP Admin management software which is used by more than 10 ACP in Switzerland.
timothe feodoroff
Timothe Feodoroff joined Urgenci staff in 2018 as project and finance manager, after been actively part of the food sovereignty movement for almost a decade.
Vinícius Cosmos Benvegnú
PhD student in Social Anthropology at the Federal University of Amazonas (PPGAS/UFAM). Master’s degree in Rural Development at the Graduate Program in Rural Development in Rio Grande do Sul (PGDR/UFRGS). Graduated in Social Sciences at (UFRGS). Graduated in Biomedicine at the Lutheran University of Brazil. Researcher at the New Social Cartography of the Amazon Project. Member of the Editorial Board of Wamon – Journal of Students of the Graduate Program in Social Anthropology of UFAM. Works related to ethnic minorities and rural populations, and themes on development, coloniality/modernity, food security and sovereignty, and health.
Wagner santos
Graduated in Administration and post-graduated in Systems Engineering. He is a consultant, founding member and member of the heart group of CSA Brazil. He is a co-farmer and member of the CSA heart group in Bauru-SP.
