Presenters

 Presentations during the November 12 event, except as noted.

  • AmyLeo Barankovich, Conference Emcee, is the founder of Teaching Compassion, a program for children K-3 that teaches respect for animals and the natural world through stories, music, movement and art.  Her lifelong advocacy for animals also includes creating children’s  educational programs and performing street theater  with the Animals Rights Coalition; being a founder of the Global Sufficiency Network; facilitating for the Alternatives To Violence Project; and most recently, crafting a public dialogue termed Claim Humane to explore and advocate a relationship with animals in which we no longer use them as utility or resource (food, clothing, medical research and entertainment). AmyLeo also teaches a dance class entitled Dancing Your Own, that helps people to discover and liberate their inner dancers.
  • (Oct 22 Event) Dayna Baumeister has worked in the field of biomimicry with Janine Benyus since 1998 as a business catalyst, educator, researcher, and design consultant. Together they founded the Biomimicry Guild, The Biomimicry Institute, and Biomimicry3.8, collectively fertilizing the movement of biomimicry as an innovative practice and philosophy to meet the world’s sustainability challenges. Dayna also designed and teaches the world’s first Biomimicry Professional Certification Program and compiled over a decade of experience into the Biomimicry Resource Handbook: A Seed Bank of Knowledge and Best Practices (2011). (www.biomimicry.net) 
  • (Oct 22 Event) Natalia Greene, born in Ecuador, coordinates the program on “Political Plurinationality and the Rights of Nature” at the Fundación Pachamama in Ecuador and is the President of CEDENMA, Ecuador’s national coordinating entity for environmental NGOs. A graduate in political science from Hampshire College, she holds a master’s degree from FLACSO Ecuador and a special degree from Andina University on climate change. She was a key figure in the effort to include the recognition of rights for nature in Ecuador’s constitution and has worked on the environmental and indigenous rights aspects of the Yasuní-ITT Initiative to keep oil underground in the Amazon.
  • Joel Hodroff, Conference Emcee, is a 30-year veteran social entrepreneur in responsible, sustainable and conscious business. He was Minnesota Finance and Commerce journal's 2005 Innovator of the Year.  He founded Solar Consultants early on in the solar industry, and co-founded Responsible Minnesota Business and Symposium Network. Dual-Currency Systems uses non-cash financial instruments for economic development.
  • John D. Liu helped open the CBS News Beijing News Bureau as producer-cameraman during the early normalization of relations between the United States and China. Since the mid-1990s Mr. Liu has concentrated on producing, writing, directing and presenting environmental films broadcast on BBC, National Geographic and other networks. His award winning film “Hope in a Changing Climate” has led to public speaking engagements on 6 continents. Liu now studies and documents restoration worldwide. (www.eempc.org)
  • Amory Lovins, a physicist, consultant to businesses and government leaders, is Chairman and Chief Scientist of Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI). He’s written 31 books and received the Blue Planet, Volvo, Onassis, Nissan, Shingo, Zayed Future Energy, and Mitchell Prizes, MacArthur and Ashoka Fellowships, 11 honorary doctorates, and the Heinz, Lindbergh, Right Livelihood, National Design, and World Technology Awards. Time named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world, and Foreign Policy, one of the 100 top global thinkers. His most recent book (in collaboration with a large RMI team) is Reinventing Fire. (www.rmi.org) 

  • Ken Meter is one of the top food system analysts in the U.S., integrating market analysis, business development, systems thinking and social concerns. As President of Crossroads Resource Center in Minneapolis, Meter holds 40 years of experience in inner-city and rural community capacity building. His “Finding Food in Farm Country” studies have promoted local food networks in 71 regions in 30 states and one Canadian province.  As coordinator of public process for the City of Minneapolis Sustainability Initiative, he guided over 85 residents in creating a 50-year vision including sustainability measures. He served as an advisor for USDA Community Food Projects including managing the proposal review panel, and serves on the editorial advisory committee of the Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development. He is co-convenor of the Community Economic Development Committee for the Community Food Security Coalition. Meter taught economics at the University of Minnesota and Harvard Kennedy School. www.crcworks.org/.

  • Melissa K. Nelson, Ph.D. (Anishinaabe/Métis [Turtle Mountain Chippewa]), (Member, Bioneers Board of Directors), a cultural ecologist, scholar-activist, writer and media-maker, is a Professor of American Indian Studies at San Francisco State and the President of the Cultural Conservancy, a Native American nonprofit dedicated to the preservation and revitalization of indigenous cultures and their ancestral lands. She is the editor of the Bioneers anthology, Original Instructions: Indigenous Teachings For A Sustainable Future and producer of the award-winning documentary film, The Salt Song Trail. She is the co-founder/co-producer of the Indigenous Forum at Bioneers and co-founder of the new Bioneers Indigeneity Program as well as serving on Bioneers’ board. (www.earthdiver.org)

  • Paul Stamets has written six seminal mushroom-related books, the most recent being Mycelium Running: How Mushrooms Can Help Save the World. Growing Gourmet & Medicinal Mushrooms and The Mushroom Cultivator are used as textbooks around the world by the specialty and medicinal mushroom industries. Paul started a medicinal and gourmet mushroom business, Fungi Perfecti, LLC, in 1980. He has received numerous environmental awards, including from Bioneers and the National Geographic, as well as Adventure’s Magazine’s Green-O-vator and the Argosy Foundation’s E-chievement awards. In 2010, Paul received the President’s Award from the Society of Ecological Restoration. (www.fungi.com)
  • (Oct 22 Event) Anim Steel is the Director of National Programs at The Food Project in Boston, MA, founded twenty years ago to create personal and social change through sustainable agriculture. It currently employs over 100 Boston-area teenagers from diverse backgrounds who annually grow, sell, and donate over 250,000 pounds of organic produce. Nationally, the Food Project is helping to build a strong youth movement for just and sustainable food systems. Since 2003, Anim has provided leadership training for over 700 young people and forged a network of 5,000+ young activists and farmers. In 2008, he co-founded the Real Food Challenge, a campaign to re-direct $1 billion of college food purchases away from industrial agriculture towards local, fair, sustainable, and humane sources. Born in Ghana and growing up in West Africa and Washington, DC, Anim holds a Master’s in Public Policy from Harvard’s Kennedy School and a B.A. in Astrophysics and History from Williams College. (www.thefoodproject.org)
  • Gloria Steinem, a world-renowned writer, lecturer, editor, and feminist activist, co-founded New York magazine in 1968 and Ms. Magazine in 1972, for which she continues to serve as a consulting editor. She has produced a documentary on child abuse, a feature film about the death penalty and been the subject of countless profiles. Her books include the bestsellers Revolution from Within: A Book of Self-Esteem, Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions, Moving Beyond Words, and Marilyn: Norma Jean, and she helped edit The Reader's Companion to U.S. Women's History. Ms. Steinem has helped found many important groups, including: the Women's Action Alliance, the National Women's Political Caucus, Voters for Choice, Choice USA, the Ms. Foundation for Women, Take Our Daughters to Work Day, the Beyond Racism Initiative, and the Women's Media Center. (www.gloriasteinem.com)
  • Mary Evelyn Tucker teaches world religions and ecology at Yale University. She helped establish this new field by organizing ten conferences at Harvard and editing ten volumes exploring views of nature in the world’s religions. She founded the Forum on Religion and Ecology that has an outreach to 12,000 people worldwide. She is a member of the Earth Charter International Council. She has edited Thomas Berry’s books and with Brian Thomas Swimme she helped create the Journey of the Universe book and film. She is the author of Worldly Wonder and The Philosophy of Qi.  (www.emergingearthcommunity.org)