Towards the Agriculture conference at the Goetheanum, Dornach, Switzerland from 2nd to 5th February 2011.

The old traditional forms of agriculture which, for thousands of years have provided the foundation for human society, are dying out.  When with our modern human consciousness we decide to work for the earth as biodynamic farmers, we are immediately challenged with burning issues. We want to realise a future for the earth through the biodynamic impulse. Although what is old and valued can interact fruitfully with new intentions, conflict often arises when a dying impulse encounters a newly germinating one; today agriculture has become a 'burning point' for society and it is burning on every farm.

For example:

• the older generation cannot find young people to succeed them while the young cannot find their place on existing farms.
• we  are forced to rationalise but simultaneously sense that by doing so we compromise the future.
• we want to work together but are confronted with the fact that everyone has a different picture of how the common enterprise should develop.
• we want time for inner work but find that the daily life of the farm demands our full attention.
• we want to redress the harm done to our planet through civilisation by spraying the preparations over the widest possible area but at the same time we are in the process of sharpening up the Demeter standards even further.
• we would like to participate actively in the big questions of out time - GMOs, climate change, the north/south divide but the existential commitment to our farms require all our resources.

The burning issues that we have, that our farms have, that our movement has - all carry within them the potential for becoming beacons of light. Beacons of light in the sense of places and times in which the future we are creating is current and contemporary amidst the fading relics of the past which continue to surround us. How do we transform these burning issues into beacons of light?

Nobody knows. No one can give a lecture about it. An agriculture conference in which suggestions for the future are exchanged is not appropriate. We can however work together and try to hear what is coming towards us out of the future.

Working together through dialogue as co-responsible participants is the objective for this 2011 conference. The work during the conference will alternate between  plenary sessions and five future-focussed workshops. The burning issues which each person brings will form the content.  This will then lead us into a process: What is the situation? What were and still are the forces creating it? Can we recognise an impulse for the future? Can I connect myself with this possible future? Does it relate to my own individual task? Can this be crystallised into an active impulse for the future?   We want to make a first attempt, a kind of prototype. Let us create the future and form it with courage and sensitivity out of what already exists.

This briefly sketched path will lead through the conference.  Claus Otto Scharmer has researched it and made it accessible. He calls it the "U" process. He will facilitate the future focussed workshops together with colleagues. Each group will be supported by second facilitator from within the biodynamic movement. There will   be translators too so that in each group along with German it will be possible to speak English, French, Spanish or Italian. An artist and a phenomenologist will also be present in order to enliven the process at appropriate moments with artistic or observational exercises. We hope that this conference will help individuals, groups and indeed the whole movement to transform burning issues into beacons of light.

This process work will be supported and stimulated by a daily reading and discussion of the 'Michael Letter' by Rudolf Steiner "What is the Earth in Reality in the Macrocosm?" The earth as a grain of sand in the dead macrocosm is here described as the source of germinating power for a future cosmos. The earth is the place where the old is transformed into the new. The self-conscious human being is likewise the transition point between thinking - focussed on the past - and will forces - which receive their impulses out of the future. By developing the right relationship between willing and thinking we can help the earth to make its transition from what is dying to what is germinating.

We will also have artistic evenings. On Thursday Elmar Lampson will bring music "Dying and Becoming" and on Friday Masha Dimitri will present her production "Proberaum"

To open the conference on Wednesday afternoon the organising group will give an introduction. There will then be a welcoming address by Stefan Brotbeck on "The Future - Aspects of a Riddle". Afterwards a key note lecture will be given by Claus Otto Scharmer on the global situation of society and on the possibility of breaking through into the future.

In the evening of the first day, Wednesday 2nd February, Vandana Shiva will speak at the Goetheanum. In India she has built up a huge network to ensure the continued free availability of seeds. She is a powerful speaker and campaigns tirelessly against untrammeled globalisation. In 1993 she received the Alternative Nobel Prize. She has been invited to speak all over the world about the future perspectives for agriculture in the 21st Century and describe the spiritual roots of her and our involvement.

This new form for the conference is a great experiment - How will burning issues become beacons of light in society? We invite you to join us in daring to make a leap into the future.

The content of the conference is what you bring with you - please share it.

For the Agriculture Section and the conference preparation group

Ueli Hurter