Komohana Research and Extension Center, Hilo, Hawaiʻi · October 1–3, 2015

Natural Farming Symposium 2015

A day of talks and hands-on skill shares in Hilo, a day of panels, then farm tours and a film. 25 recordings: nine talks including Drake Weinert's keynote, six demonstrations on the lawn, eight panels, a short ceremony and hallway interviews. Every one is checked line by line and boiled down to what was made, what was measured and what was only told.

Read what it all adds up to →

Also on the record: Konkuk 2016

Topics microbes soil economics policy health taro culture food pigs scale protectors research biochar fermentation minerals school gardens Clear

11 talks on “policy”

Vincent Mina ·USA (Hawaiʻi) ·36 min

A Sewer-Pipe Worm Trough That Eats 100 lb of Pulp a Week

Vincent Mina, state president of Hawaii Farmers Union United, opened the symposium hall talks with the story of his 2,000-square-foot greens farm and the union's policy work, then walked through slides of his backyard worm system: half-pipe troughs cut from 2-foot sewer pipe and fed health-food-store juice pulp, mineral powder, biochar and Microbes (IMO-3). He also showed how he makes IMO-3 by the ton on wheat mill run and biochar, his compost screener, a hau-flower Food (FPJ), and a taro planting on old cane land mulched with sun hemp.

Found His farm makes a living on 2,000 sq ft, producing about 400 lb of greens a week

biochar food microbes policy soil taro

Ashley Lukens ·USA (Hawaiʻi) ·60 min

Hawaiʻi Hosted 1,141 GE Field Tests to California's 172

At the Thursday lunch, Dr. Ashley Lukens, director of the Hawaiʻi Center for Food Safety, walked through her group's report "Pesticides in Paradise" on the seed companies' genetic-engineering field tests and restricted-use pesticide spraying in Hawaiʻi. She drew on industry figures, USDA field-test permits, Kauaʻi spray records and about 150 medical studies, then argued for mandatory disclosure and buffer zones around schools. Short Q&A at the end.

Found Seed crop acreage grew 10x since 1982

economics health pesticides policy research scale

Jeff Melrose ·USA (Hawaiʻi) ·74 min

Hawaiʻi Cropland Shrank From 350,000 to 153,000 Acres

Jeff Melrose, a land-use planner, previews the 2015 statewide map of Hawaiʻi's farms, made with UH Hilo's SDAV lab for the state Department of Agriculture. He stands in for HDOA chair Scott Enright, who was ill. He compares the 1937 and 1980 maps with 2015: about 153,000 acres in crops and 763,000 in pasture, down from 350,000 and 1.1 million in 1980. Then he goes island by island, adds pig and bee maps, and takes questions. HFUU president Vincent Mina introduces him and closes with a pitch for HFUU chapters and membership.

Found 2015: about 153,000 acres in crops and 765,000 acres in pasture

bees coffee economics pigs policy research

Donna Mitts, Drake Weinert, Robert Kobayashi, ʻIwalani Haia, Keliʻi Akina, Jenny, Mark Fontaine, Lou ·USA (Hawaiʻi) ·89 min

From a 6×6 Bed to 8 Acres: Natural Farming in School Gardens

Donna Mitts of the Kohala Center's Hawaiʻi Island School Garden Network introduces staff from four schools: Kalanianaʻole (Drake Weinert), Waiākea High (Robert Kobayashi), Kamehameha Schools (ʻIwalani Haia, Keliʻi Akina) and Laupāhoehoe Community Public Charter School (Jenny, Mark Fontaine, Lou). They show their gardens, pig pens and animals, and talk about money, administrators and cafeteria rules. Natural farming comes up as Microbes (IMO), Protectors (LAB), bone-based calcium and natural-farming pig pens. Nobody gives a rate or a measured result.

Found More than 60 school garden programs on Hawaiʻi Island

culture economics health microbes pigs policy

Danielle Downey, Jen Rasmussen, Jenny Bach ·USA (Hawaiʻi) ·73 min

Wild Bees Gone, Hawaiʻi Farms Now Need Beekeepers

Three Hawaiʻi Island beekeepers answer a moderator's questions and the room's: the state apiarist Danielle Downey, treatment-free beekeeper Jen Rasmussen of Paradise Nectar Apiary, and Jenny Bach, who does hive removals and works in school gardens. They cover how the varroa mite (2008 on the Big Island) and small hive beetle (2010) wiped out most wild colonies, what that means for farmers who used to get free pollination, pesticide residues in hives, fire-ant baits, and what natural farming might do for bees. Nobody on the panel had data on natural farming and bees; one beekeeper had tried a lactic-acid brew of dead beetles as a repellent.

Found Varroa reached Oʻahu in 2007 and the Big Island in 2008

bees pesticides policy pollination protectors research

Dana Keawe, Ala Jellings, Gene Tamashiro, Alika Atay, Chris Chang ·USA (Hawaiʻi) ·81 min

Kanaka Farmers: Our Tūtū Already Farmed This Way

Five Kanaka farmers and cultural practitioners from Hawaiʻi Island, Oʻahu, Maui and Molokaʻi talk about how natural farming fits old Hawaiian practice, ʻāina, health and sovereignty. Alika Atay gives the most practice: the Hawaiian moon calendar, calcium phosphate at flowering, moving the Microbes (IMO) pile, mountain and ocean water, and keeping Protectors (LAB) off fruit. Dana Keawe describes IMO made at 9,000 feet on Mauna Kea for a native-plant nursery and IMO-infused biochar in a native forest restoration.

Found Hugelkultur beds sprayed with natural farming solutions broke down faster

culture health microbes minerals policy protectors

Adam Reed, Sally Bredeweg, Kori Hasashima ·USA (Hawaiʻi) ·39 min

How NRCS Sizes a Natural Farming Piggery

Three NRCS staff, introduced by HFUU's Vincent Mina. Agronomist Adam Reed gives four soil health principles and shows a slake test of tilled against no-till soil. Engineer Sally Bredeweg works through sizing a deep-litter (IDLS) piggery for 1 boar, 3 sows and 20 growers, from square feet per pig to an 18-inch covered ridge opening. Kori Hasashima then covers NRCS practices, EQIP and the other cost-share programs, and who was eligible in 2015.

Found NRCS spent its first 75 years focused on soil erosion; soil biology is 'our new mission'

economics microbes no-till pigs policy soil

Paul Tower, Vincent Mina, Dave Sansone, David Fuertes, Bob Shaffer ·USA (Hawaiʻi) ·90 min

Food Waste to Pig Feed, Taro by Hand, Soil from a Gulch

Bill Steiner, former UH Hilo dean of agriculture, opens with innovation in old Hawaiian farming (the Kohala field system) and his own oil palm trial, then hands off to five project leaders. Paul Tower pitches a planned Oʻahu plant turning food waste into pig feed, renewable natural gas, compost and hydroponic lettuce; Vincent Mina tells how a 2,000 sq ft greens farm on Maui led him to the Farmers Union; Dave Sansone shows low-effort agroforestry; David Fuertes shows a Kohala ʻohana taro, sweet potato and natural-farming livestock project that makes Microbes (IMO) a ton at a time; Bob Shaffer describes digging up a million cubic yards of buried bagasse and soil at the old Haina sugar mill for potting soil.

Found Steiner imported 10,000 oil palm seeds of three strains from Costa Rica, about six or seven years earlier

culture economics microbes pigs policy scale

Timothy Tweets, Drake Weinert, Vincent Mina, Gene Tamashiro, Stella, J.R. Waikiki, James Cipriciano, Keahi Tajon ·USA (Hawaiʻi) ·9 min

Why They Came: Seven Voices from the Symposium

Short phone-camera interviews with people at the symposium, opening with joking between Drake Weinert, an Australian visitor and a man in an HFUU shirt. Musician Gene Tamashiro speaks on natural law and protecting Hawaiʻi from GMO laws; visitors from Australia, Maui and another island say what they came for; a young farmer explains why small farms need retail prices; Keahi Tajon talks about growing food to feed people.

Found Hawaiʻi can protect itself from GMO laws through natural law and the Hawaiian Kingdom, which 'never ended'

community culture economics microbes policy scale

Russell Ruderman ·USA (Hawaiʻi) ·11 min

Move 10% to Local Food, Keep $300 Million in Hawaiʻi

State Senator Russell Ruderman, introduced by HFUU president Vincent Mina, speaks to the symposium on the last evening. He argues that local food pays off in money, health and soil, that farm-made solutions cut Hawaiʻi's high cost of imported fertilizer, and that farmers need to get into politics to crack open markets like school food.

Found Shifting the local-vs-imported food meter 10% is worth about $300 million to the state

economics health local food policy politics school gardens

Vincent Mina, Kyle Studer, Alika Atay ·USA (Hawaiʻi) ·8 min

Not at the Table? You're on the Menu

On the last evening, just before the film, HFUU president Vincent Mina brings up two of the union's nine chapter presidents. Kyle Studer of the East Hawaiʻi chapter says farmers have to be in politics or get run over, and Alika Atay talks about regenerating poisoned land, organizing people against organized money, and asking the senator to protect Hawaiian canoe plants from genetic modification.

Found HFUU has nine chapters and has grown exponentially in five years

canoe plants culture farmers union policy politics soil