Plenary session: GMOs and GMO-free agriculture - Where do we stand?

John Dalli served as a Cabinet Minister in the Maltese Government since 1987 having been first elected to the House of Representatives of Malta on behalf of the Nationalist Party in 1987. He has served as Parliamentary Secretary for Industry (1987-1990), Minister of Economic Affairs (1990-92), Minister of Finance (1992-1996, 1998-2003) Minister of Finance and Economic Affairs and Minister of Foreign Affairs and Investment Promotion (2004). Between March 2008 and February 2010, John Dalli served as Minister for Social Policy which includes the Health, housing, employment and industrial relations portfolio.

In February 2010 John Dalli was appointed as European Commissioner responsible for Health and Consumer Policy.

Plenary session: GMOs and GMO-free agriculture - Where do we stand?

José Bové (born June 11, 1953) is a French farmer and syndicalist, member of the alter-globalization movement, and spokesman for Via Campesina. In 1987, he formed the Confédération Paysanne, an agricultural union that places its highest political values on humans and the environment, promoting food sovereignty. José Bové is also a prominent opponent of genetically modified organisms. From June to august 2002, he stays in jell for the dismantling of a restaurant Mac Donald’s, a fast-food chain. On June 22, 2003, Bové began serving a sentence of ten months for the destruction of transgenic crops. On 7 June 2009, he was elected to the European Parliament as a member of Europe Écologie, a coalition of French environmentalist political parties. He is vice-chair of the European parliament’s Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development. 

Plenary session: Presentations from Regions

Ramona Duminicioiu is a GMO Campaigner since more than 4 years. She is the president of the GMO Information Centre - InfOMG Romania. 

Plenary session: GMOs and GMO-free agriculture - Where do we stand?

Jill Evans has worked for the National Federation of Women's Institutes in Wales and for CHILD - The National Infertility Support Network. She was elected as Plaid Cymru's Alternate Member of the Committee of the Regions in 1993 and was the party's representative on the European Free Alliance. Jill was Chair of Plaid Cymru from 1994 -1996. In June 1999 she was elected as a Member of the European Parliament for Wales.She was re-elected to the European Parliament in 2004 and 2009 and is a member of the Green / European Free Alliance (EFA) Group - the fourth largest in the Parliament. She is the President of EFA, and first Vice-President of the Greens/EFA Group in the EP. She is a member of the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety and the Delegation for relations with Iraq. She deputises on the Agriculture Committee and on the Delegation for relations with the Palestine Legislative Council. She is President of Plaid Cymru, party spokesperson for European and International issues and chair of CND Cymru.

Plenary session: Presentations from Regions

Workshop: Farmers research and innovation

Christoph Fischer became an agricultural adviser since 16 years. He works with biological methods (www.em-chiemgau.de). He founded farmers' round tables and creates the Rosenheim Projekt. The Rosenheim Projekt combined different alternative methods of environmental friendly agriculture. He organised a grassroots movement for GMO-free agriculture in Bavaria and Germany (www.zivilcourage.ro). He was born in 1959.

Plenary session: Presentations from Regions

Akiko Frid, born in 1965, is a Japanese living in Sweden since 1993, and actively opposing GMO since 1996. Working with No! GMO Campaign, Citizens' Biotechnology Information Center, Consumers Union of Japan, and several consumers´ movement. A contributor of books and many articles about GMO, and made a few reports concerning GMO for Greenpeace. Currently working as the GMO Campaigner for Greenpeace Nordic. She administrates a country-wide network called Hej da GMO (Bye bye GMO), in order to make Sweden a GMO-free country. She loves diversity (originality), and freedom with responsibility.

Plenary session: GMOs and GMO-free agriculture - Where do we stand?

Plenary session: Debate: CAP reform between GM bioeconomy and regional food sovereignty

Andoni Garcia was born in 1962 in Carranza (Vizcaya), is married and has one daughter. His parents and grandparents were livestock farmers and Andoni worked on the family dairy farm since he was sixteen. For two years he was a member of the Friesian Cow Association in Vizcaya and for another two years was a member of the Executive Committee of the Basque Farmers' Union EHNE. At 27 he became a working member of EHNE, responsible for livestock sector issues of three counties within Vizcaya. He soon became responsible for livestock farming issues for the whole of the Basque Farmer's Union, EHNE and later for Spain through COAG. He was elected member of the Executive Committee of COAG in the 9th General Assembly held in Madrid in november 1997, a post that was ratified in the 10th and 11^th Assemblies of COAG held in Toledo in 2000 and Madrid 2003 respectively. He is currently responsible for the areas of Work Relations, Income Policies, Production Costs, Rural Platform, Food Security and the Environment within the Excutive Committee of COAG.

Plenary session: GMOs and GMO-free agriculture - Where do we stand?

Rodrigo Gouveia is Secretary-General of EURO COOP, the European Community of Consumer Co-operatives since May 2006. He holds a degree in Law and Post-graduate degrees in Consumer Law and in Public Economic Regulation both from the University of Coimbra. Since 1998, he had been working as Head of Department for consumer and environmental affairs at FENACOOP, EURO COOP Portuguese member organisation. He also worked as a Lawyer and Lecturer for the Higher School for Business Sciences in Setúbal, Portugal. In his capacity as Secretary-General at EURO COOP he is responsible for the general coordination of the Secretariat and of its representation activities in policy areas such as food safety, environment and ethics, consumer protection and internal market.

Plenary session: Presentations from different stakeholders and institutions

Guido Froelich was born 29.01.1967 in Schleiden/ western Germany. He studied agricultural science in Bonn and gained several years of working experience in pest control. In 1998 he joined the company tegut and he has been primarily responsible for quality management in the sector of fruits and vegetables since November 2000. 

tegut is a trading company aiming to provide good food for people.  With 6000 employees and 330 supermarkets tegut is present in Hesse, Thuringia, Franconia and the southern part of Lower Saxony.

Already in 1982 tegut began to introduce organically produced goods in the product line, by now 3000 organic products are available in the markets.

Plenary session: Debate - CAP reform between GM bioeconomy and regional food sovereignty

Workshop: GM seed contamination - the big battle ahead

Benedikt Haerlin works for the German Foundation on Future Farming in Berlin, Germany. He co-ordinates the European initiative "Save our Seeds" (www.saveourseeds.org) to keep conventional and organic seeds free of GMOs and is also a member of the International Commission on the Future of Food (www.future-food.org). He represented NGOs in the Worldbank and UN led International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (www.agassessment.org).

Haerlin was a global coordinator of Greenpeace International’s Genetic Engineering Campaign from 1996 to 2002. He continues to advise the organization. From 1984 to 1989 Haerlin served as a Member of the European Parliament (Green Group), where he specialized in genetic engineering issues. Before, he worked as a publisher and journalist in Berlin. He studied philosophy and psychology in Tübingen and Berlin. He was born in Stuttgart in 1957.

Plenary session: Debate - CAP reform between GM bioeconomy and regional food sovereignty

Dr. Herren’s (PhD ETH-Zurich) main interests and experience are in integrated and sustainable development.  He has spend 27 years in Africa, where he gained a large body of experience in development issues. With hands on experience in agricultural and ecological research, capacity development and management of research organizations, he has moved his field of activities to the policy level, to assure that knowledge, science and technology do contribute effectively to sustainable development by informing development policies at national (i.e., MDGs), regional and global levels. Special emphasis is given to an integrated, holistic and systemic approach by including the economy, society and the environment into a single analytical framework, the Threshold 21 (T21) model (www.millennium-institute.org). Dr. Herren is also the President of the Biovision Foundation for Ecological Development   (www.biovision.ch), • Co-Chair of the International Assessment of Agricultural Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD) and member of the CGIAR Science Council.

For his scientific and international development achievements, Dr. Herren has been awarded among other prizes and honors the • World Food Prize 1995; • Kilby Award, 1995; • Member US National Academy of Sciences (1999); • Tyler Prize (2003); • Brandenberger Prize (2004) • Member Third World Academy of Sciences (2005).

Plenary session: Presentations from Regions

Ralitsa Katsova is an activist from the Bulgarian GMO-free campaign, which stirred emotions, street protests and discussions between the Bulgarian Parliament and the public in the winter of 2009/ 2010. She is among the first initiators of the citizens' movement against the plan to pass legilsative changes that would allow for GMO cultivation in Bulgaria.  She has been a critical participant in the campaign promotion and public support activities, including involvement in it the most popular mothers' and women's show on a national TV; creating the visuals for the campaign used in the street protests and actions; spread of information and bringing people and celebrities together in the campaign; taking part in the negotiations with the ruling party MPs, and providing greatly for the „Post-card to the Prime-minister“initiative. At present Ralitsa Katsova is a designer at the National Historical Museum and PhD at the National Academy of Arts in Sofia. 

Plenary session: Presentations from Regions

Presentation: Synthetic biology and artificial life

Swiss biologist and chemist Florianne Koechlin, born in 1948, is well known as a critic of genetic engineering and for her various books and articles. She is Managing Director of the Blueridge-Institute (www.blueridge-institute.ch/). Her recent books are “Zellgeflüster" (“Cell Whispers", 2005) and “Pflanzen Palaver. Belauschte Geheimnisse der botanischen Welt" (“Plant Chat. Overheard Secrets from the Botanical World")

www.blauen-institut.ch/pg_blu/pa/a_pflanzenpalaver_buch.html

Plenary session: Presentations from different stakeholders and institutions

Presentation: Animal feed: GMO-free supply, alternatives and the zero tolerance dispute

Jochen Koester is a director of AgroTrace S.A. (www.agrotrace.eu), an importer-distributor of GMO-free agricultural commodities. He realized the demand for this type of business in particular after the first EU Members States had paved the regulative way to allow food manufacturers and animal producers to put a GMO-free claim on consumer products.

Koester is a founding board member of VLOG, the German industry association of GMO-free food manufacturers and producers.

He founded TraceConsult (www.traceconsult.ch), a consultancy providing advice to industry on implementing practical ethics from farm to fork, in 2004. Since 2005, eNews and Background Info by TraceConsult is a service known to strategists in industry, government and civil society worldwide for its analyses and comments of events and developments with a particular focus on the GMO issue and on sustainability.

Jochen Koester has worked in four continents in the field of creating and supplying traceable (“Hard IP”) Non-GMO commodities, with the main focus on soy products. In these areas, he has also provided advice to national and supra-national bodies in industry and government since 2000. After studying law in Geneva and Munich, he practiced law in his native Germany and lives today in Geneva.

Plenary session: Presentations from Regions

Marek Kryda is a President of Indigena Foundation - a Polish NGO of environmental experts. In the years 2007 – 2010 he has been a Member of the Steering Committee of the Coalition for GMO-free Poland. For many years he has been a consultant of Animal Welfare Institute based in Washington and a member of the Steering Committee of the Agribusiness Accountability Initiative. In 2002 – 2004 Marek Kryda was an expert of the European Commission Program “eForesee - Foresight for Policy Makers in Accession Countries”.

Plenary session: GMOs and GMO-free agriculture - Where do we stand?

Benoît Lutgen, born 1970 in Bastogne. He began his political career as Chair of PSC Youth in the electoral district of Bastogne (1995) and became Attaché to the cabinet of the Walloon Minister for Agriculture in 1998, Coordinator of the PSC’s election campaign in the province of Luxembourg to raise awareness of organ donation (1999), Secretary-General of cdH (2001 – 2002),  National campaign director for cdH and managing director of the Permanent Centre for Citizenship and Participation (2003/4). Walloon Minister for Agriculture, Rural Affairs, the Environment and Tourism (2004 – 2009). Since 2009 he is Walloon Minister for Public Works, Agriculture, Rural Affairs, Nature, Forests and Heritage.

Plenary session: Presentations from Regions

Philippe Martin (born November 22, 1953) is a French socialist deputy who fights against the proliferation of the GMO cultures in Gers. This territory of the southwest of France is very committed in the organic farming. In june 2004,  Philippe MARTIN tries to organize the first popular referendum to forbid the essays of GMO cultures in full field. It is the beginning of the juridical battle between Philippe MARTIN and the french government. On September 30th, 2009, the highest french juridiction gives reason to Philippe Martin.

The french deputy has just announced his intention to make cancelling the decision of the European Commission to authorize the marketing in the EU of six varieties of GMO corn.  A new battle is begining between a small french rural territory and industrial lobbies.

Plenary session: Debate - CAP reform between GM bioeconomy and regional food sovereignty

Peter Melchett is Policy Director of the Soil Association, the UK organic food and farming organisation, involved in campaigns and policy.  The Soil Association led the move to ban GM under organic standards and has consistently campaigned against the use of GM in farming and food. Peter also runs a 360-hectare organic farm in Norfolk, with pigs, beef cattle and arable seed crops. He is a member of the Government’s Rural Climate Change Forum, and was on the Board of the EU £12m Research Project ‘Quality Low Input Food’. 

He was a Labour Government Minister 1974-79, at the Departments of Environment, Industry, and Northern Ireland, and was then President or Chair of several conservation ngos.  He was Director of Greenpeace UK (1985-2000), when Greenpeace launched their global campaign against GM crops and Peter was one of 28 volunteers arrested for removing GM maize in 1999; all the volunteers were found not guilty in the subsequent court case.

Plenary session: GMOs and GMO-free agriculture - Where do we stand?

Jorgo Riss is based in Brussels, from where he has directed the EU policy work of Greenpeace International since 2003. With Greenpeace, Mr Riss has exposed and halted illegal shipments of hazardous wastes from Europe to developing countries and stimulated a reform of chemicals policy in the European Union. Before moving to Brussels, Mr Riss worked with Greenpeace in Amsterdam and Paris, as a reporter for "die tageszeitung" in Berlin, and taught politics at the London School of Economics. Mr Riss represents European environmental NGOs (‘Green 10’) in the EU Civil Society Contact Group, and is co-founder and member of the steering committee of the Alliance for Lobbying Transparency and Ethics Regulation in the EU (ALTER-EU), a coalition of over 140 civil society groups, trade unions, academics and public affairs firms campaigning for more transparency in EU policy-making. More information: www.greenpeace.eu, www.alter-eu.org

Plenary session: GMOs and GMO-free agriculture - Where do we stand?

Katalin Rodics studied biology at the Eötvös Lóránd Universityin Budapest, Doctorate in biology, Postgraduate degree in Nature Conservation Ecology. She worked at the National Institute of Occupational Health  (1975-1987) and in Nature Conservation Authority at the Ministry for Environment from then time on.  Katalin Rodics is Head of CITES Management Authority of Hungary, Head of Devision International Nature Conservation Treaties, Representative for the European Region in CITES  Animals Committee, member of the  National focal point of Biodiversity Convention  and head of Biodiversity Devision.

Plenary session: Presentations from different stakeholders and institutions

Workshop: Let's liberate diversity! Seeds are Common Goods not Commodities

Heike Schiebeck is a farmer, master beekeeper and a teacher for beekeeping. Ms Schiebeck was born in 1959 in Bremen and has a university degree in geography and rural research from the university of Klagenfurt/ Celovec. Since 1978 she has been living in the mountain farm of “Longo mai” in  Eisenkappel-Vellach in the south of Austria. She established and leads the women farmers association “Vellachtaler BergbäuerInnen Coppla Kasa”.  The association unites 50 mountain farms which cooperate in the marketing of their products. She is a board member of ÖBV  - Via Campesina Austria and European delegate in the international commission of Via Campesina for genetic resources.  Recently she has been a part of the organizing committee accomplishing 5^th European meeting on seeds initiatives, "Let's liberate diversity" in Garz, March 2010.

Friday's plenary session: The global perspective

Dr. Vandana Shiva is a physicist, ecologist, activist, editor, author of books. She founded the Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology (1982) in Dehra Dun dedicated to high quality and independent research and Navdanya (1991), a national movement to protect the diversity and integrity of living resources, promote organic farming and fair trade. In 2004 she started Bija Vidyapeeth, an international college for sustainable living in collaboration with Schumacher College, U.K. She initiated an international movement of women working on food, agriculture, patents and biotechnology called Diverse Women for Diversity, which was launched formally in Bratislava, Slovakia on 1-2 May 1998.

Dr. Shiva has contributed in fundamental ways to changing the practice and paradigms of agriculture and food. Her books, “The Violence of the Green Revolution” and “Monocultures of the Mind” have become classic challenges to the dominant paradigm of non-sustainable, reductionist Green Revolution Agriculture. Through her books ‘Biopiracy’, ‘Stolen Harvest’, and ‘Water Wars’ she has made visible the social, economic and ecological costs of corporate-led globalization.

She campaigns against biotechnology and genetic engineering on the international level. She has helped movements in Africa, Asia, Latin America, Ireland, Switzerland and Austria with their campaigns against genetic engineering.

Among her many awards are the Alternative Nobel Prize (Right Livelihood Award, 1993), Order of the Golden Ark, Global 500 Award of UN and Earth Day International Award.

Plenary session: Debate - CAP reform between GM bioeconomy and regional food sovereignty

Liliane Spendeler is environmental director of Friends of the Earth Spain (www.tierra.org), one of the pioneer organizations working on GMOs issues in Spain, spreading information, raising consumers and farmers’ awareness and monitoring European, national and regional policies on GMOs since 1998. She got her PhD in Physics at the University of Grenoble (France) and worked in the Solid States Physics Department at the University of Madrid (Spain) for three years. She began to cooperate with Friends of the Earth Spain in 1998 and took on the coordination of the GMO campaign in 2000, which made her one of the few specialists on this issue in the country and part of the campaign of Friends of the Earth Europe (www.foeeurope.org). In 2003 she became a member of the board and since 2009 she has been an environmental director at FoE Spain.

Plenary session: GMOs and GMO-free agriculture - Where do we stand?

President of the IFOAM EU Group, Board Member and Trustee of Pesticide Action Network – UK, Chairman of the independent Certification Scrutiny Committee of Soil Association Certification Ltd., Director of EcoS Consultancy Ltd with a primary focus on organic food and farming, climate change and animal welfare. He was previously Head of Research at the Organic Research Centre – Elm Farm and has degrees in biological sciences and agriculture.

Plenary session: Presentations from different stakeholders and institutions

Pierre-Alexandre Teulié joined Carrefour on Sept. 1st, 2009 as General Secretary.

He has an excellent knowledge in both Public and Private sectors of activities. He began his career within the Financial Department of Procter & Gamble France in 1991 before entering in the French Public Sector , in 2002, as Cabinet Director of the Gard district Prefect and thus as General Secretary in the Lot district Prefecture. In 2004, he joined Nestlé Waters France as Director of External Affairs until 2007, when he became Councilor to Mrs. Christine Lagarde, the French Minister of Economy, Industry and Employment.

Plenary session: Presentations from different stakeholders and institutions

Christian Vélot, PhD, is a Senior Lecturer in Molecular Genetics at the University of Paris-Sud. He is a Member of the Scientific Council of the Committee for Research and Independent Information on Genetic Engineering (CRII-GEN, France), and the Deputy Chairperson of the European Network of Scientists for Social and Environmental Responsability (ENSSER). He is deeply involved in scientific popularization, and  organises a lot of conferences about GMOs for the general public.

Presentation: How to declare a GMO free region?

Charlotte is settled as a baker in an ecovillage in the center of France. Charlotte has worked as a coordinator for a rural organization dedicated to young people. The aim of the organization is to support the settlement of young people as farmers, organize exchanges between young farmers and rurals from France, India and Guatemala.

Charlotte has lived 3 years in Berlin working for the Foundation for Future Farming and organising Planet Diversity Conference in 2008.  She wrote her Master thesis in European law in France.

Presentation: How to lobby at the EU level?

Workshop: How to use the changes in the new EU legislation to achieve a GM-free Europe?

Since four years Marco Contiero is the Policy Director on Genetic Engineering and Sustainable Agriculture for Greenpeace EU Unit in Brussels, providing legal and political strategic advice to the organization. Previously in Greenpeace he worked for two years as an expert on toxic trade and the REACH Regulation. In 2004 he worked as a legal advisor to the European Environmental Bureau on EU environmental law. Between 2000 and 2003 Contiero worked as a lawyer in Padua, Italy. He holds a Master of Laws in European Business Law with specialization in European Environmental Law from the University of Amsterdam, a Master of Laws in International Trade from the University of Padua, and a Law degree.

Workshop: A new tool: The European Citizens Initiative

Steve Emmott is a British lawyer who has campaigned on genetic engineering issues for many years. He helped run the UK Genetics Forum, the first European NGO dedicated to the subject, and was a founder member of GENET.He has worked as an expert advisor for the Greens in the European Parliament and is currently a member of the executive committee of the European Green Party.

Workshop: The Role of GMO-free Regions under the New EU "coexistence" Guidelines

Thijs Etty is Assistant Professor of EU (environmental) law at the Vrije University Amsterdam, and Head of the Research Cluster on European Law and Policy on Sustainability (ELPS) at the Institute for Environmental Studies (IVM). He also works as an independent legal consultant, primarily on issues of agricultural biotechnology law and EU environmental policy, with clients including Greenpeace and other NGO’s, government and corporate. Etty is a member of Slow Food, representative member of the IUCN Academy of Environmental Law, and Research Fellow in various international research networks, including the Earth System Governance Network, Global Governance Network, and Ius Commune International Legal Research School.

Plenary session: Presentations from Regions

Workshop: Farmers research and innovation

Christoph Fischer became an agricultural adviser since 16 years. He works with biological methods (www.em-chiemgau.de). He founded farmers' round tables and creates the Rosenheim Projekt. The Rosenheim Projekt combined different alternative methods of environmental friendly agriculture. He organised a grassroots movement for GMO-free agriculture in Bavaria and Germany (www.zivilcourage.ro). He was born in 1959.

Plenary session: Debate - CAP reform between GM bioeconomy and regional food sovereignty

Workshop: GM seed contamination - the big battle ahead

Benedikt Haerlin works for the German Foundation on Future Farming in Berlin, Germany. He co-ordinates the European initiative "Save our Seeds" (www.saveourseeds.org) to keep conventional and organic seeds free of GMOs and is also a member of the International Commission on the Future of Food (www.future-food.org). He represented NGOs in the Worldbank and UN led International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (www.agassessment.org).

Haerlin was a global coordinator of Greenpeace International’s Genetic Engineering Campaign from 1996 to 2002. He continues to advise the organization. From 1984 to 1989 Haerlin served as a Member of the European Parliament (Green Group), where he specialized in genetic engineering issues. Before, he worked as a publisher and journalist in Berlin. He studied philosophy and psychology in Tübingen and Berlin. He was born in Stuttgart in 1957.

Movie:  Farmer to Farmer: GM Crops in the USA

Michael Hart is a first generation family farmer in Cornwall in the south west of England producing lamb and beef, after finishing his agricultural education in 1976 he worked as a farm manager, in 1979 he started farming some rented land part time and in 1986 he rented his first farm, he moved to his present farm in 1992. He is a campaigner on behalf of family farming as the most sustainable system of farming.  His campaigning has covered many aspects from driving his tractor from Cornwall to Parliament in London in protest at the way farming was viewed by the government, he has worked at promoting a better understanding of farming with the public in the UK, he has lead the way in the UK working with many other organisations, so that the voice and thoughts of  family farmers was heard, including environmental organisations, international NGO's, art, heritage and culture groups and many others. He has formed links to many farming organisations around the world as chairman of the Small and Family Farms Alliance, of which he is a founder member. He also writes on farming for both farming and for non farming publications. He is also chairman of the Rural Cultural Forum which works on promoting cultural, heritage and art in rural England.  He has also travelled to many parts of the world, meeting fellow farmers and many others and speaking on both international and UK/European farming issues as a farmer.

Presentation: Modifying life - paradigms and perspectives

Education: Doctor of Medicine in bacteriology, virology, immunology, parasitology and hematology Bachelor's degree in philosophy

Experience: Assistant in bacteriology at the medical teaching hospital Paris XIII; Voluntary physician in Africa; Head of laboratory in Noumea; Researcher in the neurochemistry at the laboratory led by Pr. Baumann (hospital Pitié-Salpétrière, Paris); Researcher in the immunology laboratory of Pr. Coutinho at the Pasteur Institute of Paris; Head of the GIET research association, administrator of France Nature Environment (largest environmental association in France); Representative of environmental organizations at the French Molecular Engineering Commission; Head of Inf'OGM.

Plenary session: Presentations from Regions

Presentation: Synthetic biology and artificial life

Swiss biologist and chemist Florianne Koechlin, born in 1948, is well known as a critic of genetic engineering and for her various books and articles. She is Managing Director of the Blueridge-Institute (www.blueridge-institute.ch/). Her recent books are “Zellgeflüster" (“Cell Whispers", 2005) and “Pflanzen Palaver. Belauschte Geheimnisse der botanischen Welt" (“Plant Chat. Overheard Secrets from the Botanical World")

www.blauen-institut.ch/pg_blu/pa/a_pflanzenpalaver_buch.html

Plenary session: Presentations from different stakeholders and institutions

Presentation: Animal feed: GMO-free supply, alternatives and the zero tolerance dispute

Jochen Koester is a director of AgroTrace S.A. (www.agrotrace.eu), an importer-distributor of GMO-free agricultural commodities. He realized the demand for this type of business in particular after the first EU Members States had paved the regulative way to allow food manufacturers and animal producers to put a GMO-free claim on consumer products.

Koester is a founding board member of VLOG, the German industry association of GMO-free food manufacturers and producers.

He founded TraceConsult (www.traceconsult.ch), a consultancy providing advice to industry on implementing practical ethics from farm to fork, in 2004. Since 2005, eNews and Background Info by TraceConsult is a service known to strategists in industry, government and civil society worldwide for its analyses and comments of events and developments with a particular focus on the GMO issue and on sustainability.

Jochen Koester has worked in four continents in the field of creating and supplying traceable (“Hard IP”) Non-GMO commodities, with the main focus on soy products. In these areas, he has also provided advice to national and supra-national bodies in industry and government since 2000. After studying law in Geneva and Munich, he practiced law in his native Germany and lives today in Geneva.

Presentation: Animal feed: GMO-free supply, alternatives and the zero tolerance dispute

Heike Moldenhauer, born 1964, received her degree in philosophy and in German language and literature from the Free University in Berlin. She is head of the section for biotechnology policy at Friends of the Earth Germany.

Plenary session: Presentations from Regions

Gabriel Paun, born 1977, is a biologist and a leading critic of GM crops in Romania for the last 9 years. He has served the cause of a GM free Romania as campaigner for several nongovernmental organizations: Greenpeace (2005-2008), Ecosens (2001-2004) and Agent Green (2009 till present). During his high-profile campaigns the cultivation of GM soya has been banned, illegal experiments with Gm potatoes and plum trees has been stopped and a new project law for a 5 years moratorium on cultivation of all GM crops is currently debated in the Romanian Parliament (2010).

Workshop: Farmers research and innovation

Haiko Pieplow is part of an international Work-Net of Zero Emissions Projekts (www.zeri.org). He founded together with the Institute of Applied Material Flow Management the German bottom up Zero Emissions Network (www.Null-Emissions-Netzwerk.de). His special field is the new economy (www.blueeconomy.de). He rediscovered the secret of anthropogenic dark earth (www.das-gold-der-erde.de, www.triaterra.de) in 2005. He studied agriculture at Rostock University and became an ecologist and soil scientist. He was born in Radeberg in 1957.

Presentation: BASF & Co

Workshop: Preparing for commercial and  experimental planting 2011

Christof Potthof is a full staff member of Gen-ethical Network (GeN), based in Berlin, Germany. The organization works on a broad range of biotechnology issues, including genetic engineering in agriculture and food production, reproductive technologies and biopolitics. Christof has a German diploma in biology. He works in several coalitions on the local, regional, national and the European level. Christof is one of the editor‘s of GeNs bi-monthly journal GID (published in German).

Plenary session: Presentations from different stakeholders and institutions

Workshop: Let's liberate diversity! Seeds are Common Goods not Commodities

Heike Schiebeck is a farmer, master beekeeper and a teacher for beekeeping. Ms Schiebeck was born in 1959 in Bremen and has a university degree in geography and rural research from the university of Klagenfurt/ Celovec. Since 1978 she has been living in the mountain farm of “Longo mai” in  Eisenkappel-Vellach in the south of Austria. She established and leads the women farmers association “Vellachtaler BergbäuerInnen Coppla Kasa”.  The association unites 50 mountain farms which cooperate in the marketing of their products. She is a board member of ÖBV  - Via Campesina Austria and European delegate in the international commission of Via Campesina for genetic resources.  Recently she has been a part of the organizing committee accomplishing 5^th European meeting on seeds initiatives, "Let's liberate diversity" in Garz, March 2010.

Workshop: How to use the changes in the new EU legislation to achieve a GM-free Europe?

Mute Schimpf studied Organic and International Agriculture,

After three years as an editor for the magazine “Bauernstimme”, she coordinated the German network for GMfree Agriculture on behalf of AbL, the German Member of Via Campesina.

Followed by some years as a policy advisor on Agriculture Trade Policy and Biodiversity with the Catholic Development NGO Misereor.

In September 2009 she started as an Assistand for the Green MEP, Marting Haeusling. Since June 2010 as Food Campaigner with Friends of the Earth Europe.

Workshop: The policies of knowlegde based bioeconomy

From 1977 to 1984 Piet Schenkelaars studied Molecular Sciences and Philosophy of Science at the Agricultural University Wageningen in the Netherlands. After his studies he co-founded Kontakt Groep Biotechnologie, an independent group of young academicians, with the aim to inform environmental, consumers, farmers, rural women, animal welfare, trade union, third-world and church groups about R&D and regulatory policy developments in biotechnology and the potential impacts on agriculture, food production, the environment and nature. In 1990 he became co-ordinator of the Clearinghouse on Biotechnology at Friends of the Earth Europe in Brussels. In 1993 he returned to the Netherlands to work for a Dutch environmental consultancy in the area of biosafety regulations and environmental risk assessment of GMOs. From 1996 to 1998 he worked for a Dutch communication consultancy, where he was involved in communication activities surrounding the first arrival of GM crops on the market. In 1998 he founded Schenkelaars Biotechnology Consultancy (SBC). Since then SBC has worked for and with individual companies, environmental and consumer organizations, national ministries and research institutes, the European Commission, and the UN Economic Commission for Europe. See http://www.sbcbiotech.nl/

Workshop: Costs of coexistence

Studied agronomy and did his PhD in Agricultural Economics. He started his career as research assistant at the university of Hohenheim, Department of Agricultural Economics. He was project manager of EU OFCAP (1997 – 1999),  Manager LVÖ, Germany (1999 – 2001). Presently he is lecturer for economic and political impacts of organic farming, University of Hohenheim, Germany and lecturer for policy evaluation; ETH Zurich, Switzerland. Since 2001 he is member of board of directors, Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL).

Workshop: State of environmenal risk assessment, science and regulations and EFSA

Workshop: Synthetic Biology and artificial life

Workshop: Costs of coexistence

Workshop: GM seed contamination - the big battle ahead

Christoph Then is a qualified veterinary surgeon who has been working for over 15 years in the field of biotechnology. From 1992 until 1998 he coordinated the No Patent On Life! campaign in Germany. He worked from 1995 until 1998 as an expert advisor on agriculture and genetic engineering for the Green Party in the Bavarian Landtag (legislative assembly in a German state). From 1999 until 2007 he was Greenpeace Germany’s expert on agriculture, genetic engineering and consumer affairs. Periodically he coordinated Greenpeace’s EU activities in connection with the risk assessment of genetically engineered plants.
Christoph Then is advisor to the Gen-ethischen Netzwerk network (Berlin) and a member of the Gesellschaft fuer Oekologische Forschung (Society of Ecological Research Association) based in Munich.
Christoph Then also acts as a Coordinator for the Coalition "No Patents on Seeds" and is a special adviser for Greenpeace on this issue.

Links http://www.scouting-biotechnology.net

Workshop: Patens on Life

As a biologist I am since many years at the initiative „No Patents on Life!“ in Munich, Germany.

There we are watching since more than ten years the European Patent Office in the field of biotechnology. Together with Christoph Then, Greenpeace or Testbiotech, we are filing selective oppositions against patents on plants, animals and gene sequences.

„No Patents on Life!“ is part of the coalition „No Patents on Seeds“ where we observe any decision of the broccoli-case and other patents on plants from conventional breeding.

I am born 1944 in Zurich, Switzerland, did my studies in biology in Tübingen and Munich, Germany, and my PhD at the Max-Planck-Institut for Molecular Biology in Berlin. I am married and we have two adult children.

Workshop: The policies of knowlegde based bioeconomy

Helen Wallace is Director of GeneWatch UK (www.genewatch.org ). She is the author of a new GeneWatch report on the biotech economy which describes how and why governments and the EU made the decisions to invest public money in developing GM crops and foods and human genetic testing.

Her scientific background is in environmental modeling. She worked in the science unit at Greenpeace UK from 1994, joined Genewatch in 2001 and became its Director in 2007. Since then she has published numerous reports, briefings, journal articles and book chapters on genetic science and technology.

Christine von Weizsäcker is biologist, author and activist. Since the mid 70s she is committed to area of technological impact assessment. Main issues are atomic energy and biotechnology. More than 10 years now she is involved in the discussion on the Biosafety Protocol  and the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). She is member of the scientific advisory council of the German ministry of agriculture, member of the advisory board of the Gen-ethical Network (GeN), Federation of German Scientists (FGS), Ecoropa and part of the founding committee of "Diverse Women for Diversity".