Manager’s comment: 2012 is the U.N.’s declared International Year of Co-operatives.  In recognition of this, the Conference has worked with multiple representatives from the organic food co-operative & other co-op sectors to design this Thursday 1/2-day program.  Feel free to call or discuss with the Ontario Natural Food Co-op staff (Hannah Renglich or Randy Whitteker), or with staff from the Ontario Co-operative Association (Mark Ventry).  Likewise, any of the staff of The Big Carrot, Camino Products and several other co-ops with an organic focus can bring you up to speed.  Highly experienced co-op consultant Russ Christianson, can also help you.

Stay tuned. 

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SYMPOSIUM

BUILDING LOCAL ORGANIC VALUE CHAINS USING CO-OPERATIVE STRUCTURAL MODELS

(12:00 – 4:30 pm, Room UC103 – capacity 125 guests).

NOON: Registration outside Room UC103; view displays from co-ops & pick up pre-ordered organic box lunches in Room UC103.

Case study highlights from successful co-ops, recognizing the U.N.’s International Year of Co-operatives.

1:00 pm: Denyse Guy (ON Co-op), Russ Christianson (Rhythm Communications), Hannah Renglich (Local Organic Food Co-ops), Randy Whitteker (ONFC) on co-operative value chains in organic food and farming.

2:15 pm: Break

2:30 pm: Panel from co-ops in different sections of the value chain: growers, processors and retailers focused on local, organic, fair trade and community-building values.

3:30: Discussion on challenges and opportunities.

4:00 pm: Summary, actions, next steps.

Cost: $55 (students $20) + HST.

Organic boxed lunch $12 + HST, by pre-order up to Jan. 6 only, served at noon in the UC103 room. Or bring your own brown bag, or purchase at the very large and diverse University Centre Café (that’s Centre 6) literally a few feet from the UC103 room – i.e. next door.

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THURSDAY EVENING

A CLIMATE CHANGE CHARETTE: community input leading to workable solutions. (5:30 pm – 8:00 pm, Room UC442)

Phil Beard (Maitland Valley Conservation), Karen Landman & Ralph Martin (U of Guelph), Ricardo Ramirez (independent researcher-consultant) & Sally Ludwig (Transition Guelph) join in identifying how organic agriculture can be transformed to elimate dependency on fossil fuels while restoring the health of our ecosystems and adapting to climate change.

Continuing the work of climate change/peak oil workshops from past Guelph Conferences.

Cost: $20 general admission ($10 student) + HST. Register at Room UC103 then go up to the 4th floor for the workshop.

 

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IMPORTANT BACKGROUNDER ON WHAT THIS CLIMATE CHANGE CHARETTE IS ALL ABOUT.

Manager’s comment: we have run variations of this program during the Sunday segment of the Conference workshops for the last few years.  This year’s 2012 effort is an expansion – it is an evening program with a looser schedule and a minimum 2.5 hours of time to explore, invent, extrapolate, create and deliver.  BE SURE to put this on your Guelph Thursday evening program.  At $20 (adult) and $10 (student) this is another one of our “very good value for money” seminars.

Dear Leaders and Supporters of Organic Agriculture: - A Renewed Invitation: How to Develop a Transformation Strategy for Agriculture?

As a follow-up to the 2011 workshop on Climate Change and Peak Oil held during the Organic Conference, we are inviting you to a NEW workshop format that will take place the evening of Thursday January 26, from 5:30pm to 8pm (guests should register at Registration Room UC103, with the Charette to be held upstairs in UC442).

We remain focused on 2 key questions:

1) What is the organic sector doing to respond to the challenges of climate change, depletion of fossil fuels and other resources, and economic contraction?

2) What can we do to encourage and support the organic sector to improve its environmental performance?

We are introducing some changes for the next workshop and we are asking you for your feedback.  The first change has to do with format.  We will use a participatory brainstorming method called the charette (details below). This allows participants to brainstorm in small groups in a structured and focused manner, instead of listening to a lecture.  We are proposing to have the leaders of organic organizations work together around one such table. Other tables will bring together participants with different common objectives. The results of each table will be summarized and shared in plenary with other tables.  Karen Landman, from the University of Guelph, will have graduate students that are familiar with the method facilitating the group work.

A second, change is to engage representatives from the Transition Movement http://www.transitionnetwork.org/ who have also been focusing on community-led responses to climate change and shrinking supplies of cheap energy. Sally Ludwig (Transition Guelph) and Barry Randal (Walkerton) will bring examples of transition communities that are embarking on making fundamental change. They are also offering to rotate as resource people for each group, providing suggestions of transition methods and examples from their experience.   Among other things, we will share a summary of Rod MacRae’s paper “Developing a strategic plan to address climate change, ecosystem degradation and dependency upon fossil fuels: Making the organic sector climate-ready and resilient.”

It is hoped that by using this process we can develop a strategy that all of our organizations can support and use to guide future work to address these challenges.

If you expect that you and perhaps others from your organization will participate in this event, please contact Ricardo Ramirez at ramirez2196@sympatico.ca at your earliest convenience. We also welcome your comments about how to make this a useful event for you.

Sincerely,

Ricardo Ramirez, Independent                                       Phil Beard, General Manager,
researcher-consultant, Guelph                                       MCIP, RPP Maitland Valley CA

Ralph C. Martin, Ph.D., P.Ag., Professor
Loblaw Chair Sustainable Food, Univ. Guelph

What is a charette?

By Professor Karen Landman
School of Environmental Design and Rural Development
University of Guelph

A charette is a time-limited (perhaps an afternoon, a day, or a few days), multi-participant event organized to generate a collaboratively produced plan or course of action. Charettes challenge participants to collaboratively discuss and solve what may appear to be an impossible problem in what might seem to be an absurdly short time. Essentially, charettes are of two kinds: visioning charettes and implementation charettes; one can imagine blended possibilities as well. Visioning charettes are focused on what ‘could be; implementation charettes are conducted when there is a need for an implementable plan.

Many stakeholders are invited to participate; it is important to have the ‘right’ people in the room. The charette begins with one, two or a series of presentations on information that is needed by the group in order to tackle the problem. The participants are then organized into a number of smaller groups and given a task. Everyone is given an absolute deadline to complete the work at a certain point in time, with no exceptions. There is often a group leader assigned to each group by the charette organizers; the leader’s job is to facilitate the discussion and record the ideas of the group. It is important that the leader makes space for each person to be heard; the group must work within an atmosphere of empathy, understanding and respect.

The value of the charette process is that it creates a common language of solutions; it is a no-risk process; it is powerfully integrative; it is fast and efficient; and it is inexpensive. The outcome of the charette will depend on the charette goal. Typically, the groups produce drawings or large sheets of paper outlining points developed by the groups; these products are often publicly displayed so that a broader audience can benefit from the ideas generated. Another outcome is the sharing of knowledge and opinions, and a course of action.

(Adapted from Condon, P.M. 2008. Design Charettes for Sustainable Communities)