Second General Assembly on How to Scale up Regenerative Agriculture to Feed the World and Cool the Planet

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

September 22, 2017

English: Katherine Paul, 207.653 3090, Katherine@regenerationinternational.org

Spanish: Ercilia Sahores, +52 (55) 6257 7901, ercilia@regenerationinternational.org

SAN MIGUEL DE ALLENDE, Mexico – About 105 experts in soil, water and land management, agriculture, media and campaign strategy assembled today in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, for a three-day international conference on how to scale up organic and regenerative agriculture, land management and livestock grazing to address global warming, global food insecurity and public health.

Representatives from 21 countries are attending the three-day strategy meeting organized by Regeneration International (RI), a project of the Organic Consumers Association (OCA). 

The conference is being held at OCA’s Vía Orgánica teaching farm and conference center. It is RI’s first global strategy meeting since the organization’s initial launch in June 2015, in Costa Rica.

“We are in the terminal phase of a degenerative food and farming system which forms the underlying basis for war, poverty, poor health and food insecurity,” said Ronnie Cummins, OCA’s international director and a member of the RI steering committee. “The hundreds of millions of small-scale farmers and herders around the world have the power to turn things around. They need our support to scale up regenerative farming and land-management practices that will draw down and sequester carbon, produce abundant, nutrient-dense food and regenerate local economies.”

“This is a gathering about the future of the world, pure and simple, said Larry Kopald, co-founder of The Carbon Underground, a founding partner of RI. “If we don’t quickly draw down carbon and restore our soil, we will lose the chance to keep feeding the planet and to deal with climate change.”

Andre Leu, president of IFOAM International and an RI steering committee member said: “This is the beginning of one of the fastest-growing movements in the world. The word ‘regeneration’ is resonating. We have the science now to scale up regenerative farming. We have the responsibility to scale it up. If we don’t, we face a real threat of extinction by the end of this century.”

Participants of the General Assembly will attend sessions on how to fund and scale up the Regeneration Movement, how to support the France’s 4/1000 Initiative: Soils for Food Security and Climate, and how to build a grassroots movement around regenerative food, farming and climate.

Regeneration International is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization building a global network of farmers, scientists, businesses, activists, educators, journalists, governments and consumers who will promote and put into practice regenerative agriculture and land-use practices that: provide abundant, nutritious food; revive local economies; rebuild soil fertility and biodiversity; and restore climate stability by returning carbon to the soil, through the natural process of photosynthesis.