Episode #23: Hawaii Agriculture Conference 2019, Talk Story w/ the Keynotes & A Few Speakers

Today we will continue our Sustainable Leaders series and join some of the keynote speakers and panelists from the Hawaii Agriculture Conference 2019 held at the Hawaii Convention Center.  We will begin w/ Taylor Kellerman, Board President of the Agriculture Leadership Foundation of Hawaii and Director of Diversified Agriculture & Land Stewardship of Kualoa Ranch.  We will then jump right into the two keynote speakers, Jamie Tuuta & Michelle Galimba and close w/ three other speakers from the conference: Stephanie Mock, Jayme Barton and Jacob Tavares.

Jamie Tuuta, keynote: Chair of the New Zealand Tourism Board, which is responsible for marketing New Zealand as a global destination. He is inspired by the opportunities for New Zealand to be an exemplar for other countries. He is also the Chair of Māori Television, Te Ohu Kaimoana (the Māori Fisheries Commission) and Taranaki Mounga, an ambitious project with a vision to restore ecological resilience to more than 34,000 hectares from the mountain to the sea. As the former Māori Trustee and CEO of Te Tumu Paeroa, he administered 100,000 hectares of Māori land throughout the country. Jamie is passionate about investing in innovation and increasing the economic and environmental performance of New Zealand’s primary industries, particularly the Māori pastoral and fishing sectors, and developing the capacity and capability of Māori.

Michelle Galimba, keynote: Michelle runs Kuahiwi Ranch w/ her brother, Guy Galimba. Their family ranch provides locally grown beef to supermarkets, farmer’s markets and restaurants on O‘ahu and Hawai‘i Island. She grew up on dairy farms in Hawai‘i and has been involved with her family’s ranch since it started on abandoned sugar-cane acreage in the early 1990’s. Having grown up in agriculture in Hawai‘i, she has seen first-hand the stresses and constraints which make farming and ranching particularly challenging. She is interested in the key role that agriculture, small farms in particular, plays in addressing the big challenges of our time: economic inequity, political dis-enfranchisement, biodiversity loss, and climate change. Michelle has served on the State of Hawai‘i’s Board of Agriculture and is currently a Director of the Farm Credit Service of Hawai‘i and other agricultural and conservation programs and non-profits. IG: @kuahiwi_ranch | www.kuahiwiranch.com

Stephanie Mock is the Sustainable Manager, Kualoa Ranch and moderated the panel on Cultivation, Carbon and Collaboration: Adapting the Carbon Model for Hawaii's Farms and Ranches. IG: @kualoagrown & @kualoaranch 

Jayme Barton, Program Lead, Healthy Soils Hawaii was a panelist on panel above | jaymebee@gmail.com | IG: @jaymebee

Jacob Tavares, Ranch Manager, Mahi Pono, A Maui Farming Company who spoke about the panel: Pathways to Sustainability | IG: @mahipono | FB: @mahipono | www.mahipono.com

Hawaii Ag Conference: https://www.hiagconference.org/ | Program:  https://www.hiagconference.org/2019program.html

Ag Leadership Foundation of Hawaii: IG: @alf_hawaii | FB: @ALFHawaii

Smart Living Hawaii at: Website: www.SmartLivingHi.com |  IG: @smart_living_hawaii |  FB: @SmartLivingHawaii