Sat, 25 Feb 2006

Former German ministers attend annual Goetheanum agriculture conference

By Michæl Olbrich-Majer DORNACH (NNA) – The renewal of agriculture can only occur if there is an emphasis on quality. With these words, the current leader of the Greens in the German parliament and former agriculture minister in the previous Social Democrat/Green government coalition, Renate Künast, encouraged the 500 Demeter farmers gathered at the Goetheanum in Dornach to stay true to their principles.

Bio-dynamic farmers from all over the world meet each year in Dornach at the beginning of February for their annual conference: this year they discussed ways to a new agriculture.

Agriculture, and organic agriculture in particular, is undergoing rapid change: rising turnover, expanded markets, industrialisation, falling prices, new players in the market. The subject of the conferences “Identity and Openness”, prepared by the Agriculture Section of the School of Spiritual Science, offered the opportunity to discuss directions, values and methods in forums, working groups and lectures, to go back to the roots at a time when even organic agriculture is becoming conventional.

If Renate Künast had challenged the farmers to think ahead of their time and enter into alliances to continue the ecological transformation of agriculture, the dialogue with possible allies was also initiated during the four day conference at meetings between activists from the fields of permaculture, SlowFood, nature conservation, development aid, fair trade and the anti-genetic engineering movement.

Guests from the international organic farming movement presented their perspectives on a renewal of agriculture for discussion and made suggestion as to how to proceed. Biodynamic farmers from Britain, Brazil, Canada and India reported on their successes in the face of huge obstacles.

In more than 50 working groups, courses and seminars, participants had the opportunity to deepen the discussion of biodynamic practice ranging from health to the appropriate legal form for agricultural enterprises.

At a press briefing given by Renate Künast, it also became clear, however, that the path to a more ecological agriculture was fraught with difficulty, given the current political circumstances – reversal of the progress made in German agricultural policy, pressure to make savings in the EU budget. It was therefore all the more important to convince broad sections of society to take responsibility for their own health and the health of nature. There should be no shortage of partners for the biodynamic farmers in this task, the former agriculture minister said.

Ursa Krattiger adds:

The politicians Renate Künast und Herta Däubler-Gmelin, the Social Democrat (SPD) former justice minister who also attended the agriculture conference, gave an impressive performance in their speeches. The SPD politician warned in her lecture of the growing influence of the genetic engineering lobby on politics with its reach extending into university research.

The two former ministers were an unusual sight on the Goetheanum stage, with the sovereign body language of women used to defending their aims and vision with quick-witted rhetoric in a highly competitive environment. In the more intimate surroundings of a press or other briefing they were friendly and genial whilst concentrating on the task in hand and clear in expressing their views. The two were in a class of their own yet without a hint of self-importance.

It was fascinating to see through their interaction at the conference how the two politicians must have worked in tandem while still in government in Berlin – Künast as minister for consumer protection, food and agriculture in the executive and Däubler-Gmelin as head of the parliamentary committee for consumer protection, food and agriculture in the legislature.

As a result they achieved a great deal – a point made by Joachim Bauck, biodynamic farmer, who stressed in a media briefing that more had been set in motion to promote organic agriculture during the five years as a minister of Renate Künast than in the previous thirty years.

While Künast demanded the radical ecological transformation of agriculture, Däubler-Gmelin stressed that the task now was to preserve the environment and cultivated landscape, to ensure the sustainability and quality of food. The EU objectives were good and coherent, but their implementation, the corresponding support, the control measures were too much divorced from reality. The German farmers’ associations, for example, received huge subsidies but did not accept any conditions regarding ecology, sustainability, nature conservation or the revitalisation of rural areas. The rules for the protection of animals were also good – at least on paper – but the sad reality of the mass transport of animals was a different one nonetheless.

Ecological agriculture and renewable energy

In his welcome address at the start of the conference, Urs Niggli, the director of the Research Institute for Organic Agriculture/FiBL in Frick, spoke of the huge damage inflicted on the climate by industrial agriculture. Renate Künast encouraged the organic farmers to follow the example of the reinsurance industry, which had meanwhile moved its investments into renewable energy – not least because of climate change – because this was considered to be safest in the long term. Organic agriculture should work to bring about a similar change of opinion because industrial agriculture represented an irresponsible approach to people and the environment.

Däubler-Gmelin said that each individual aspect had to be fought for, such as the “polluter pays“ principle and the issue of coexistence (GM crops polluting organic crops in the vicinity). Her motto might well have proved a direct inspiration to many attending the conference: “I am a theoretical pessimist and a practical optimist. You have to give it a try, and in as intelligent and persistent way as possible!”

Use advertising more effectively

The former justice minister also suggested that the organic movement had to use advertising more effectively. It had to appeal to consumers not just in an abstract manner through the head but also to their yearnings and feelings. In contrast to the cynical and dishonest advertising which shamelessly sold milk from conventional mass production with images of happy cows in green fields, organic products should top that with true, living and attractive images of rural landscapes run on organic lines – letting consumers feel at an emotional level that they were both purchasing a high quality food and at the same time supporting a method of agriculture, with a landscape in which they might well like to live or at least spend a Sunday or a holiday: “What is being abused by conventional advertising should be used by us to activate positive, responsible consumer behaviour.” The rejection of GM foods by the vast majority (70%) of consumers should be transformed into a preference for truly fresh regional organic products, or as the slogan has it: “Eat the landscape”.

Renate Künast, chair of the Bündnis 90/Greens parliamentary group, was German minister for consumer protection, food and agriculture from 2001 bis 2005. The Social Democrat Prof. Herta Däubler-Gmelin was German justice minister from 1998 to 2002 and has taught law and politics at the Free University Berlin since 1996. She also heads the parliamentary committee for consumer protection, food and agriculture.

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Michæl Olbrich-Majer is Editor of the farming journal “Lebendige Erde” Ursa Krattiger is head of the Swiss Anthroposophical Media Centre

Item: 060225-01EN 25 February 2006

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