ONLINE — The National Center for Appropriate Technology’s third annual national conference begins February 28, 2023. This free virtual convening spread across six days will feature renowned speakers and showcase farm stories that make the connection between our changing climate, healthy soils, and farm productivity and resilience.
Growing Hope: Practical Tools for Our Changing Climate will take place over three weeks, with sessions occurring on Tuesdays and Thursdays through March 16. The first week’s focus will be climate and soils. Week two will address ecosystem health, and week three will cover community resiliency. Participants can register once for all six sessions.
“This year we are excited to center climate and amplify the critical connection between atmospheric carbon, carbon-rich soil and soil fertility, agroecosystem dynamics, farm productivity, and adaptation to intensifying weather extremes,” said Elise Hashke, NCAT Climate and Agriculture Program Manager and Conference Co-Lead. “Farmers and leading experts will illuminate concrete actions for practicing and supporting climate-beneficial land stewardship and building ecosystem and community resilience.”
Keynote speakers will include Dr. Rattan Lal, Distinguished University Professor of Soil Science at The Ohio State University, Dr. Elizabeth Heilman, a professor of science education at Wichita State University, and Eric Toensmeier, author and lecturer at Yale University. Other sessions will feature discussions on carbon farm planning, reducing synthetic fertilizer use, ways agroforestry practices benefit farms and the climate, and regenerative grazing’s climate impact. Two sessions will focus on ways farmers are building resilience on their farms, and ways agricultural community members can support each other in challenging times.
“We want producers to walk away from this conference with a variety of tools they can use to build resilience on their own farms and ranches,” said Nina Prater, NCAT Sustainable Agriculture Specialist and Conference Co-Lead. “We want to offer hopeful stories and examples from around the country of folks already engaged in climate adaptation and mitigation.”
Each Tuesday session will last for three hours, and each Thursday session is two hours with optional networking after-sessions.
Find dates, times, and details about each session and register for the conference at ATTRA.NCAT.ORG/ANNUAL-
THE NATIONAL CENTER FOR APPROPRIATE TECHNOLOGY has been helping people build resilient communities through local and sustainable solutions that reduce poverty, strengthen self-reliance, and protect natural resources since 1976. Headquartered in Butte, Montana, NCAT has field offices in Arkansas, California, Colorado, Idaho, Kentucky, Mississippi, Montana, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Texas. Learn more and become a friend of NCAT at NCAT.ORG
–National Center for Appropriate Technology
