Bioneers Conference Draws Diverse Leaders

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Jessica Scadron for Bioneers
Jessica@socialplanets.com
415-713-9150

World-renowned experts will address healthcare reform, green jobs, organic food and farming, green building, and social justice at annual conference that turns education into action

Bioneers (www.bioneers.org), a nonprofit educational organization that highlights breakthrough solutions for restoring people and planet, has unveiled the speaker line-up for its annual conference taking place in San Rafael, California October 16-18. Headliners include visionary innovators in health and nutrition, organic food and farming, green building, green jobs and social justice, including Dr. Andrew Weil, Michael Pollan, Annie Leonard and Jerome Ringo. Known as an incubator for cutting-edge solutions and strategies, Bioneers presents leading-edge practical projects and ideas that spark hope, action and inspiration. Early registration is now open at www.bioneers.org/conference.

”The next 10 years are the make-it-or-break-it window to move breakthrough solutions into action,” says Bioneers CEO and founder Kenny Ausubel. “Our efforts over the past 20 years to connect people with solutions and each other are meeting an unprecedented receptivity today. There is cause for real hope.”

“Selected from diverse perspectives, generations and cultures, our presenters reveal a future vision of hope and healing that we’re all wanting and working toward,” notes Bioneers president and cofounder Nina Simons. “Their leadership, stories and presence offer encouraging examples and mentorship, reminding us just how big a difference each of us can make.”

Headlining speakers for the conference include:

Dr. Andrew Weil, the nation’s foremost authority on Integrative medicine, is author of numerous bestselling books including Spontaneous Healing and Eight Weeks to Optimum Health. Drawing from his newest book, Why Our Health Matters: A Vision of Medicine That Can Transform Our Future (September 2009), Dr. Weil will illustrate how making the critical link between human and environmental health can transform the healthcare system to benefit public health, the economy and the environment.

Michael Pollan is the award-winning author of bestsellers including The Omnivore’s Dilemma, and In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto. As a contributing writer to the New York Times Magazine, he is among the most influential thinkers on food and agriculture. Pollan will highlight front-line initiatives to redesign our destructive food system.

Annie Leonard, world-renowned creator of “The Story of Stuff” – an Internet film illustrating the environmental and social consequences of consumerism – will portray her film’s influence as a worldwide Internet phenomenon that is making change from classrooms to boardrooms.

Jerome Ringo is president of the Apollo Alliance and the first African-American to head a major conservation organization, the National Wildlife Federation. Ringo will examine the escalating green jobs movement and the political traction it is gaining federally and locally with the emerging green energy economy.

As a leading-edge forum where social and scientific innovators focus on solutions inspired by nature and human creativity, the Bioneers three-day conference will draw together luminaries from a range of cultures and disciplines:

• Almir Narayamoga Surui is an Amazonian tribal chief who has spent more than 15 years fighting for the survival of his Surui tribe and the Amazon rainforest. Chief Almir will tell the astonishing story of how he connected with Google Earth Outreach and is using their technology to protect his people and preserve the rainforest with laptops instead of weapons.

• Jason McLennan, CEO of Cascadia Green Building Council and a leading figure in the green architecture movement, will show breathtaking examples of the buildings that raise the bar on what green building can do by mimicking nature.

• Lily Yeh, an internationally celebrated artist from Philadelphia and founder of Barefoot Artists, Inc., will portray how art is healing ravaged environments as well as the hearts and minds of traumatized communities through examples of her own work, such as her innovative projects in Rwanda.

• Mari Margil, associate director of the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund, portrays her team’s historic work on the groundbreaking decision to include ecosystem rights in the new Ecuadorian constitution, and plans to launch the effort worldwide.

• Joanna Macy is a celebrated Buddhist teacher, philosopher and activist in the peace, justice and ecology movements. Author of noted books including Coming Back to Life: Practices to Reconnect Our Lives, Our World, and World as Lover, World as Self, Macy will explore the contemporary “fear factor” that chains human creativity and freedom.

• Jack D. Hidary, acclaimed entrepreneur, co-founder of SmartTransportation.org and chair of AmericansforCleanEnergy.org, will show how the U.S. can rapidly transition to a green energy economy in the near term, and create widespread prosperity by doing so.

• Sarah James, Gwich’in elder from Arctic Village, Alaska and Goldman Environmental Prize winner for protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, will illustrate the devastating impact climate change is having on her people and how indigenous people are responding to the crisis.

• Arturo Sandoval, one of New Mexico’s most prominent civic leaders, will explore how traditional Southwestern Hispano and indigenous cultures have employed a shared ecological commons as a sustainability strategy.

• Brock Dolman, founding member of Occidental Arts and Ecology Center and director of their water institute, will illustrate highly successful land and water management practices that restore nature, community and the economy.

• Kari Fulton, Brower Youth Award winner and national campus campaign coordinator for the Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative, will describe how youth nationwide are fostering a more unified and diverse 21st century environmental movement.

• Jensine Larsen, founder of World Pulse Media, will portray her experiences building an interactive global media enterprise that empowers women worldwide to speak out and collaborate with one another to solve global issues.

As a special evening event, “Visionary Activism” KPFA radio legend and author Caroline Casey will join forces with Dr. Andrew Weil for a stand-up improvisation on the state of the world.

Celebrating its 20th anniversary conference, Bioneers attracts more than 3,000 people at its main conference, and another 9,000 at numerous local satellite conferences nationwide. In addition to over 150 speakers, the three-day event will host the Indigenous Forum featuring indigenous leaders, pre- and post-conference workshops with top experts on greening education and green jobs, and visits to organic farms and the Marin Farmers Market. The Youth Program will again bring hundreds of engaged youth and educators for special activities and discussions.

For more detailed registration and programming information on Bioneers, visit http://www.bioneers.org/conference.

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About Bioneers

Bioneers is a nonprofit educational organization that highlights breakthrough solutions for restoring people and planet. Since 1990, Bioneers has acted as a fertile hub of social and scientific innovators with practical and visionary solutions for the world’s most pressing environmental and social challenges. A celebration of the genius of nature and human ingenuity, Bioneers connects people with solutions and each other. Its acclaimed annual national and local conferences are complemented by extensive media outreach including an award-winning radio series, book series, and role in media projects such as Leonardo DiCaprio’s film The 11th Hour.