14th Sustainable Living Fair announces keynote speakers, including Joel Salatin

The 14th annual Sustainable Living Fair’s keynote speakers include third-generation alternative farmer Joel Salatin.

Salatin is scheduled to speak Sept 15 at 2 p.m. The Sustainable Living Fair runs Sept. 14-15 in Fort Collins.

Salatin he returned to the the family farm in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia full-time in 1982 and continued refining and adding to his parents’ ideas.
 
The farm services more than 3,000 families, 10 retail outlets, and 50 restaurants through on-farm sales and metropolitan buying clubs with salad bar beef, pastured poultry, eggmobile eggs, pigaerator pork, forage-based rabbits, pastured turkey and forestry products using relationship marketing. He holds a BA degree in English and writes extensively in magazines such as Acres USA, and American Agriculturalist.
 
The family’s farm, Polyface Inc. (“The Farm of Many Faces”) has been featured in countless radio, television and print media. Profiled on the “Lives of the 21st Century” series with Peter Jennings on ABC World News, his after-broadcast chat room fielded more hits than any other segment to date.
 
A sought-after conference speaker, he addresses a wide range of issues, from “creating the farm your children will want” to “making a white collar salary from a pleasant life in the country.” A wordsmith, he describes his occupation as “mob-stocking hervbivorous solar conversion lignified carbon sequestration fertilization.” His humorous and conviction-based speeches are akin to theatrical performances, often receiving standing ovations.

Other speakers include:
 
• Sept. 14 at noon – Larry Korn an educator, consultant, editor and author in the fields of permaculture, natural farming, sustainable landscaping and local food production. He spent several years working on the Japanese island of Skikoku as a student of Masanobu Fukuoka, farmer, philosopher, and a leader in the worldwide sustainable agriculture movement. Korn helped translate and edit the English language versions of Fukuoka’s books, bestseller “The One-Straw Revolution” and “Sowing Seeds in the Desert.”  
 
Korn studied Chinese history, soil science and plant nutrition at the University of California Berkeley and has written articles for such publications as Mother Earth News, Rodale’s Organic Gardening, and Tilth. 
 
• Sept. 14 at 2 p.m. – Greg Michaud instructs the Sustainable Living Association’s Backyard Chicken series and Organic Gardening Ecology workshops.  
 
Greg is a long-time holistic gardener turned sustainable ecofarmer/health-foodie with training in organic certification inspection. He and his wife Patty run “The Old Feed Store” and “The Old Farm Stand: A Clean Food Alliance,” hosting local growers and food producers in farmers market and farm-direct sales support.  
 
• Sept. 15 at noon – U.S. Rep. Jared Polis, D-Boulder, is an independent leader who uses his private and public sector experience to find pragmatic solutions to the challenges facing Colorado and the nation. First elected to represent Colorado’s Second Congressional District in 2008, Polis serves on the powerful Committee on Rules, the Committee on Education and Workforce, and the House Democratic Steering and Policy Committee. Polis believes that education is the single most meaningful investment America can make in its economic future and in its people. His efforts in this area focus on getting accountability right at all levels, expanding educational models that work, and improving persistently failing schools with data-driven models to reduce achievement gaps.
 
Polis also works with Democrats and Republicans to reform our nation’s broken immigration policies, to advance the cause of civil rights and equality for all, and to protect Colorado and the world’s natural beauty and environment. While still attending Princeton University, Polis co-founded his first company, American Information Systems, a success he followed with the launching of bluemountain.com and proflowers.com. He has been named an “Entrepreneur of the Year” by Ernst and Young.
 
The Sustainable Living Fair is the largest event of its kind in the Rocky Mountain region, attracting more than 11,000 attendees from across the Country. The Fair offers a weekend of solution-based, interactive, family oriented events designed to educate people of all ages and backgrounds about sustainable living practices, renewable energy, green building, natural health, social responsibility, organic and local agriculture and more.  
 
The Fair will once again be held at Legacy Park located in downtown Fort Collins at 300 Woodlawn Drive. Legacy Park is just north of Lee Martinez Park and is central to downtown, the bike path and the Poudre River.  
 
For more information visit www.SustainableLivingFair.org.