Anya Fernald - Anya Fernald served as Program Director of Community Alliance with Family Farmers (CAFF) for three years. At CAFF, she led three primary projects active in six regions of California: a Farm-to-School program active in over 90 schools; a social venture produce distribution company; and the California Buy Fresh, Buy Local Campaign.
Fernald came to CAFF after five years with Slow Food International. A graduate of Wesleyan University, Fernald spent a post-graduate year of study as a Thomas J. Watson Fellow.
Corby Kummer - Corby Kummer's work in The Atlantic has established him as one of the most widely read, authoritative, and creative food writers in the United States. The San Francisco Examiner pronounced him "a dean among food writers in America."
Julia Child once said, "I think he's a very good food writer. He really does his homework. As a reporter and a writer he takes his work very seriously."
Kummer's 1990 Atlantic series about coffee was heralded by foodies and the general public alike. The response to his recommendations about coffees and coffee-makers was typicalsuppliers scrambled to meet the demand. As Giorgio Deluca, co-founder of New York's epicurean grocery Dean & Deluca, says: ''I can tell when Corby's pieces hit; the phone doesn't stop ringing." His book, The Joy of Coffee, based on his Atlantic series, was heralded by The New York Times as "the most definitive and engagingly written book on the subject to date.''
In nominating his work for a National Magazine Award (for which he became a finalist), the editors wrote: "Kummer treats food as if its preparation were something of a life sport: an activity to be pursued regularly and healthfully by knowledgeable people who demand quality."
Kummer's recent book, The Pleasures of Slow Food, celebrates local artisans who raise and prepare the foods of their regions with the love and expertise that come only with generations of practice. Kummer was restaurant critic of New York Magazine in 1995 and 1996 and since 1997 has served as restaurant critic for Boston Magazine. He is also a frequent food commentator on television and radio.
He was educated at Yale, and came to The Atlantic Monthly in 1981. He is the recipient of three James Beard Journalism Awards, including the MFK Fisher Distinguished Writing Award.
Raj Patel - Raj Patel received his PhD in Sociology from Cornell University and has worked at the World Bank, World Trade Organization, and the United Nations. He is a writer and activist concerned with land reform politics, development studies, and food sovereignty. He authored Stuffed and Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System.
Carlo Petrini - Carlo Petrini founded the International Slow Food Movement in 1989. He first came to prominence in the 1980s for taking part in a campaign against the fast food chain McDonald's opening by the Spanish Steps in Rome
He is an editor of multiple publications at the publishing house Slow Food Editore and writes several weekly columns for La Stampa. He was one of Time Magazine's heroes of 2004.
Vandana Shiva - Born in India in 1952, Vandana Shiva is a world-renowned environmental leader and thinker. Director of the Research Foundation on Science, Technology, and Ecology, she is the author of many books, including Water Wars: Pollution, Profits, and Privatization (South End Press, 2001), Biopiracy: The Plunder of Nature and Knowledge (South End Press, 1997), Monocultures of the Mind (Zed, 1993), The Violence of the Green Revolution (Zed, 1992), and Staying Alive (St. Martin's Press, 1989).
Shiva is a leader in the International Forum on Globalization, along with Ralph Nader and Jeremy Rifkin. She addressed the World Trade Organization summit in Seattle, 1999, as well as the recent World Economic Forum in Melbourne, 2000. In 1993, Shiva won the Alternative Nobel Peace Prize (the Right Livelihood Award). The founder of Navdanya ("nine seeds"), a movement promoting diversity and use of native seeds, she also set up the Research Foundation for Science, Technology, and Ecology in her mother's cowshed in 1997. Its studies have validated the ecological value of traditional farming and been instrumental in fighting destructive development projects in India .
Before becoming an activist, Shiva was one of India's leading physicists. She holds a master's degree in the philosophy of science and a Ph.D. in particle physics.
It's widely acknowledged that we are in the middle of a world food crisis. Skyrocketing food and fuel costs, water scarcity, and population explosions have communities worldwide in the grip of hunger and dire food shortages. Come listen to four of the foremost authorities on the subject as they share forecasts and potential solutions for this immense global challenge- Slow Food Nation
The trade off between intense diverse production and extensive mono culture is a direct result of industrialization. Fewer tonnes of food off fewer acres grown by fewer farmers so the rest of the people could move to cities. I do not see that trend reversing itself, although there has been a recent revival in city gardens.
Fertilizers and modern farming methods in north america do not degrade soils, if anything reduced tillage technology developed over the last 20 years has improved soil structure and tilth visibly in my fields.
GMs are fine, not the final solution just yet. Our understanding of plant genetic engineering is far greater than the speakers suggest. Suggesting kindergarten knowledge is insulting.
According to Pimentel D. Environmental and economic costs of the application of pesticides primarily in the United States. Environment, Development and Sustainability. 2005;7:229–252; there are environment public health impacts from pesticides and fertilizers as they contaminate soils, groundwater, and streams.
