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3-2-05
HUNTER LOVINS TO DISCUSS 'ENERGY AND SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE'
Author and energy analyst Hunter Lovins will examine the challenges that
Iowa farmers face and how they can be leaders in making their operations
and communities more sustainable as part of a two-day event March 9-10
in Ames and Centerville.
Lovins is president of Natural Capitalism, a Colorado-based company that
helps businesses, government, academic institutions and communities
become more profitable and environmentally and socially sustainable. She
is the keynote speaker for the John Pesek Colloquium on Sustainable
Agriculture.
The annual event, now in its fifth year, honors retired Iowa State
University agronomy professor John Pesek. It is coordinated by the Henry
A. Wallace Endowed Chair for Sustainable Agriculture at Iowa State.
The colloquium will open Wednesday, March 9 on the campus of Iowa State
University in Ames. Lovins will present "Energy and Sustainable
Agriculture" beginning at 2:30 p.m. in the Pioneer Room of the ISU
Memorial Union. Panelists who will lead a discussion of Lovins'
presentation include Robert Anex, associate professor of Agricultural
and Biosystems Engineering at ISU; Iowa State sustainable agriculture
graduate student Ann Finan; and Mark Kingland with Alliant Energy.
On March 10, the colloquium will feature a town meeting beginning at
2:30 p.m. on the Centerville campus of Indian Hills Community College.
Following Lovins' comments, several people from the area have been
invited to share their perspectives about energy and sustainable
agriculture. They are:
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John Sellers, chair, State Soil Conservation
Committee, Corydon;
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Steve Gardner, president, Prairieland Bioproducts,
Inc., Centerville, and president of the Wapello County Farm Bureau;
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Janet Swaby, Indian Hills Community College; and
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Dave Miller, director of research and commodity
services for the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation.
Both sessions are free and open to the public, and will
be followed by receptions.
For more than 30 years, Lovins has advocated sustainable development
through creation and management of several companies and corporations
that promote sustainable resource use and management. She has taught at
various universities, advised citizen groups, governments and
corporations and is the author of nine books including Natural
Capitalism in 1999.
In 1982, Lovins co-founded the Rocky Mountain Institute, which developed
under her leadership into a world-renowned resource policy center. Time
magazine named Lovins a "Hero of the Planet" in 2000, and was one of
four North American delegates to the United Nation's prep conference for
the World Summit on Sustainable Development.
The colloquium honors John Pesek, who served terms as president of both
the American Society of Agronomy and the Soil Science Society of
America. His research led to a better understanding of the effects of
farming practices on the environment.
In the late 1980s, Pesek chaired a National Research Council committee
that produced "Alternative Agriculture," a groundbreaking report that
documented how farming systems that use less pesticides, fertilizers,
antibiotics and fuel can be productive and profitable.
Co-sponsors include the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture,
Alliant Energy and the ISU Energy Center, plus ISU Lectures, the North
Central Regional Center for Rural Development, ISU Sustainable
Agriculture Extension, Office of Biorenewables Programs, Global
Agriculture Programs and the College of Business. Other co-sponsors are
Indian Hills Community College, Practical Farmers of Iowa and the Women,
Food and Agriculture Network.
For more information,
contact:
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