Circular 102 Winter 2012/13
Dear readers,
As protagonists in the biodynamic movement we are faced with a three-fold challenge: 1. We want to have good farms and to offer good produce. 2. We want to nurture an inner culture of biodynamics. 3. We want get involved in the great questions of our times such as gene technology, climate change, famine.
It was the Agricultural Conference 2011 – “From burning Issues to Beacons of Light” – which made this three-fold challenge clearly visible.
What is the essence of the biodynamic impulse? The suggestion for the following year was to examine this question individually and together we worked on it for the Agricultural Conference 2012. The result may be formulated as: the essence of the biodynamic impulse expresses itself through the inner attitude with which we connect inner and outer and also man and nature. It may be summarised in four words: Honesty, openness, co-operation and initiative. Honesty we learn from the soil. Openness we learn from the plants. Co-operation we learn from the animals. Initiative can only come from the human being.
Now, in this year and in the coming agricultural conference with the title “Alliances for the Earth” it comes down to seeking to work together with other committed contemporaries. Thus the focus is directed towards the third challenge of 2011. However, the outward path – with alliances – also calls for the inward path. In a preparatory workshop with the laboratory leaders, which we ran with Nicanor Perlas, this became clearly obvious. The call from the world, which I hear, must be taken into my inner life, into the inner dialogue with the question: can I change something in the world without being ready to change something in myself? The creative moment,
which allows the alliance to become more than a mere marriage of convenience, springs from the possibility of awakening through the everyday ego to the higher ego, and of bringing this moment as potential for the future into the community of the alliance. Thus we are at the second challenge.
And this relationship of outer and inner, stretched really far in both directions, - in the direction of general fellowship with contemporaries and of the most individual ego qualities – needs the solid and concrete ground of our practical farming activity. For this reason the laboratories at the coming conference are related practical themes. Thus, they will do justice to the first challenge.
Thus, with the forthcoming conference we will come to a kind of synthesis and the space for creativity which was opened up by the question of the burning issues will find a certain closure. We are all the more glad to be able to convey in this circular our early thoughts on a new direction to work in.
We wish you a time of contemplation at Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Ueli Hurter Jean-Michel Florin Thomas Lüthi
2 CONTENTS
Editorial...... 1 On the theme of the year 2012/13 Alliances for the Earth Jean-Michel Florin...... 5 Forming Alliances: the Call of the World for inner Development Ambra Sedlmayr and Jean-Michel Florin...... 8 New theme of the year Heading towards a new Theme of the Year Ueli Hurter...... 11 The Child of Europe Ueli Hurter...... 14 Reports from around the world Report on Italy Sabrina Menestrina...... 17 Report from China Thomas Lüthi...... 19 From the work of the Section Is the international biodynamic movement a social organism? Ueli Hurter...... 20 International Biodynamic Council – IBDC Thomas Lüthi...... 23 Sending off the first biodynamic Ambassador Ambra Sedlmayr...... 24 The Landscape Project Jean-Michel Florin...... 24 The Vine project Jean-Michel Florin...... 26 The Nutrition Project Jean-Michel Florin...... 28 Report of the Excursions and Meeting of the Circle of Representatives in South Tirol from 30th October to 3rd November 2012 Jean-Michel Florin...... 29 Agenda...... 33
3 4 On the theme of the year 2012/13 Alliances for the Earth Jean-Michel Florin
Our world seems to be sinking deeper and deeper into crises. What is a crisis? If one casts one’s gaze towards nature, a crisis can be observed wherever something new is meant to come about. For instance, the caterpillar of the butterfly goes through a crisis when it pupates, when its body becomes a formless milky substance. How can the imago come about from that? Can the current crises lead to a metamorphosis of our society? And how can we support this metamorphosis?
If we attempt to find a common denominator for the current crises, we ascertain that they all have to do with a particular view of the world: the earth, plants, animals and, in the meanwhile, the human being as well have been made into objects, into things. We could talk about an “objectification of the world”. For the past five hundred years science has limited itself to the measurable and has made the immeasurable measurable or else ignored it; for example, the relationship between farmers and their livestock, which is not measurable but is perceivable, has been ignored and pushed aside as unimportant. Thus industrial agriculture could be developed (see the article “The Secret of Relationships” in Circular 101, summer 2012).
This development has its significance for human evolution: it has helped us to free ourselves from the narrow bonds and traditions into which we are born. It has helped people to assert themselves as a personality, as an ego. The question which arises from the crisis of individuals detaching themselves from the world is: how can I make a new connection with the world in a conscious and free way? This is the task of the consciousness soul.
The objectification of the world and all creatures went a stage further in the last century and in this one; with the progressive commoditisation everything is degraded into a commodity. The whole world is for sale; most recently, even plots of terrain on the moon!
This commoditisation is the source of a lot of the problems of today, which affect agriculture world-wide, especially in the poorer countries: • The land question: land is made into a commodity. There are companies and governments, which buy huge areas of farming land in other countries and through their property rights cut back access to land more and more. This increases the number of landless farmers or of young people, who have difficulty finding a piece of land to farm and for their livelihoods. • Common property (water, seed,..) is turned increasingly into commodities, i.e. privatised. • Labour is turned into a commodity (and thereby the human being too); and it is always too expensive for the employers. Agriculture would have a lot of work places to offer, but people cannot and do not want to pay for them. The number of the unemployed is rising accordingly and speaks its own language. • Likewise money is degraded to a commodity so that money can be earned with
5 money. The gap between poor and super rich is getting wider and wider. • Food has not only become a commodity, but an object of speculation, which is the cause of food scarcity crises and famine. • A further current example is the transformation of landscape into a commodity. At present, the economic value of areas of nature and landscapes is being calculated, and, in fact, it is in the belief that they are better able to protect them, when they know that nature provides its services worth millions of dollars free of charge. Is it like that? Actually it is not, for thereby the unique quality of each area of nature is reduced to a number. If people want to destroy some part of nature, this can be replaced by another with the same economic value. In the process the uniqueness of each landscape is overlooked: exactly the opposite of what we as biodynamic farmers are striving to develop, namely the creation of an individual farm organism.
Whoever has enough money can have possessions and thus hinder other people from accessing the fundamentals of life. Since we live in a time of objectification, ‘having’ is more important than ‘being’ and therefore the possibility of acquiring something for oneself is being fully exploited by those who can afford it – to the detriment of everyone else. Thus the number of people who are ‘-less’ is continually increasing (landless, workless, homeless, penniless, food-less, voiceless, etc.). All these people are ‘outcasts’. A lot of other living beings are also outcasts: weeds, animals in factory farms, eradicated animals and plants, etc.
Here it is important to understand that a world-view which makes everything into objects and commodities does not allow for any inwardness of the creatures to exist; there is only the physical, material world. However, more and more people are arriving at a different world-view. In this respect it is interesting to read the study of the American sociologist, Paul Ray. In the form of many interviews he carried out a sociological investigation of American society over ten years ago. In it he discovered three tendencies, which run straight across the political spectrum: • The modernists. You could call them the “Prometheus people”. They are the people who think that everything is better than before, that technological progress will solve all the problems. For them the world has no inherent meaning; it has come about by accident through the Big Bang. For this group the human being is only the product of hereditary forces and environmental influences, individuals have no ‘inwardness’, thus there can only be divisions between people of different cultures as Samuel Huntington has predicted in his essay “The Clash of Civilisations”. This world-view is actually unbearable: in order to bear it, you have “to amuse yourself to death” or try to forget. • The traditionalists. It is typically the group of people who think that everything was better before. They are always looking for the old traditional values, which have been destroyed by modern science. And they easily become Integrists, dogmatic people. • Between these two opposing groups a free space arises, where a new tendency is in the process of coming about. They are people (who earlier on belonged to the one or the other group) , who have gone through an inner turning-point. For these people the inwardness of the individuality is a fact; they have experienced it as a great strength, which has sometimes expressed itself in
6 outrage or anger - perhaps the unexpected success of the book ‘Empört Euch!’ (Give Vent to your Outrage!) by Stéphane Hessel can be explained by him touching a nerve of our times. In his seminar on conflicts Friedrich Glasl described how he uses people’s memory of the greatest moment of anger so as to lead them to discover their basic values.
Paul Ray calls this new group the “cultural creatives”. He portrays them as as a new social movement, which is in the process of arising. They sense that the world has meaning and that the human being can build up a real connection to the world, since the earth and living creatures are not just things , but beings. These people have mostly discovered for themselves in a truly personal sense at one moment in their lives that for reasons of their inmost conscience (which is definitely a sign of the consciousness soul) they want to concretely change something in their lives. Many activists, as, for example, activists for human rights, the rights of minorities, for the environment, for animals, for an ecological way of life, etc. belong to this group.
Even if they have different world-views they have it in common that they decide to become involved not for traditional reasons (because they belong to a family, a community, a culture or a country) and not for egoistic, utilitarian reasons, but, on the contrary, completely out of their inner conscience, out of their individual choice. They have strengthened their individual core so as to detach themselves from the old structures. It is a group of people, which is getting bigger and bigger and which is developing lots of small and larger concrete initiatives everywhere in many fields (environment, agriculture, economics, culture, etc.).
They are people with whom we will come to build alliances more easily, if, instead of putting the world-view (anthroposophical. organic, permaculture, etc.) in the centre, we take this common, concrete, inner experience as the centre ground. Out of reasons of my innermost conscience I want to have a different approach to the earth and living creatures. People are looking for what connects them , not what divides them. This exercise could also be very important within the biodynamic or anthroposophical movement, as the impression prevails that each person has such a different viewpoint that no collaboration is possible.
According to Paul Ray this group of people is in danger of believing that they alone think in this way and therefore are able to change little of reality. According to him this group is relatively large and could develop great power, especially in civil society. The difficulty of the people in this group is that just because everyone would like to think individually, freely, collaborating with others is made harder. When I develop my individual self strongly, there is the danger that I develop my ego too one-sidedly. Arthur Zajonc once said, “Too much ego, ego, ego”. When we reflect deeply on this observation, we may discover that the ego in order to become a proper ego needs the encounter with the ‘you’. The philosopher, Martin Buber, writes, “The fundamental word I-you can only be spoken with one’s whole being. The gathering in and fusion to one whole being can only happen through me, can never happen without me. I become on the basis of you; whilst becoming I, I say you. All true life is encounter.” Here we touch on a very important motif of the alliance: developing one’s own ego in the encounter with the others and working out into the world with others.
7 At the Agricultural Conference 2013 we are called upon to practise this encountering. To this end there will be Alliance laboratories, in which we want to come with concrete themes from our involvement in biodynamics and our specialist knowledge, if possible, to the first stages of concrete alliance building. Our hope is that a lot of people will participate and that you as readers of this circular will encourage people around you to attend the conference; it is open to all who are interested – to all ‘culture creatives’ – in and around the biodynamic movement.
Forming Alliances: the Call of the World for inner Development Ambra Sedlmayr and Jean-Michel Florin
On 17th and 18th October the Agriculture Section organised a workshop on forming alliances with Nicanor Perlas as a preparation for the leaders of the Alliance Laboratories at the agricultural conference.
Meeting Person to Person Working together on an equal footing, which is founded on the meeting of person to person, is the basis of forming alliances. For this reason Nicanor Perlas has structured the workshop in such a way that the participants can learn alongside each other and from each other: this is the basic inner attitude behind forming alliances.
In the search for alliance partners the question often arises as to who we can work together with. We frequently find that this or that grouping, who are actually following similar goals to ourselves, is too materialistic after all, too power hungry, too media oriented, etc. ! Is it our lower ego which is putting up a powerful fight and is clouding our view for what is good and what connects us? Do we not have a common concern about the future after all?
We cannot presume to know on the basis of our prejudices how the other person thinks and how he or she will act. A first step in forming alliances is to be open and to want to get to know the other and understand him or her, particularly with regard to how the other person sees the problem that we would like to face together. However, we must be honest with respect to our own opinions and intentions. Furthermore, forming alliances requires clear focusing on the common goal and at the same time flexibility with the process.
Three Levels of the Alliance An alliance is the combining of organisations and individuals who want to tackle a concrete problem in the world. The alliance is formed by the relationships of individual human beings who are active in this alliance. These relationships, in turn, are a result of the state of the individual people. What the individual can put into the alliance depends heavily upon the question of how far his lower self stands in his way and to what extent he can be creative out of his higher self. This is what the reality which can arise from this working together depends on.
8 Programmed People foster the existing System and vice versa The problems which we meet in the world and which we would like to resolve are created by us human beings. The reality which we experience is formed from the existing societal structures of power and dependence that we know very well; these structures are created by bodies and institutions of various kinds (which are based on human relationships at the end of the day), which consist, in turn, of individual people. As is apparent from figure 1, you will see that, on the one hand, people create reality (current reality) and, on the other, that they are themselves shaped by this reality. The question is then, how can people bring something new into the world in order give truly new answers to existing problems? How can old structures be broken through and new ones created which are based on the responsibility of free individuals?
Figure 1The causal connection: programmed individuals create a compulsive system; a compulsive system produces programmed individuals. How do we break through the cycle?
Finding new Impulses: the Lemniscate Process Our everyday self meets a problem in the outside world. This problem is like a call to us to change something (1. call on the diagram). Now it is up to us to take this problem on; if we do so, we go through a phase which has the character of an inner trial (2. trial). We do not know how to carry on and are in search of a solution, of a possibility for acting. However, in this situation we open ourselves too, and ideas can come to us. We can receive a moral Intuition (see Rudolf Steiner’s “Philosophy of Freedom”) from our higher self (3).Now we suddenly know how to carry on! Through this moment of clarity we have gained strength, which helps us to take the necessary steps to put the idea into practice. Thus we can change reality through the power of our higher self and
9 create a new reality (4. return).
In time this new reality can be experienced once more as problematic and we sense a renewed call. The process begins anew, but each time on a somewhat extended level: we must develop new faculties, etc. Now we are not entitled to think that the method, which helped us last time, will solve the new problem as well. We must find a completely new solution for the new problem; the path across the lemniscates begins all over again. For if we think, feel and act as before, we shall only create our old problems anew.
Figure 2 – The lemniscate process: 1- Call of the world; 2 – inner trial; 3 – moral Intuition; return to the world.
That means that what I can change in the world, whether I can bring in something new, depends on how I am within myself and whether I can have contact with my higher self. I cannot change something, if I remain in my everyday self. This inner work can have consequences for my personal development, for my relationships, for the changing of systems, for instance, through the work in alliances. This working in the world in order to encounter concrete challenges and threats with alliances requires us to go an inner path. Thus, what people from the biodynamic movement describe as a three-fold challenge can be connected up: the challenge that things go well on the farm, that people go an inner path and that they do not sleep through the issues of the times.
10 New theme of the year Heading towards a new Theme of the Year Ueli Hurter
At the Circle of Representatives’ Meeting in South Tirol we held two conversations on finding a new theme of the year. Previously and subsequently the leaders of the Section also discussed it. There follows a brief account of the course of our search.
The leaders of the Sections outlined the suggestion of covering a range of themes in three years; this time looking at what practical activities are being carried out on our farms, whilst working with biodynamics: our productive involvement with soil – plants – animals. This links in with our striving as a Section to awaken and strengthen the assured competence in forming judgements and making decisions of many people as much as possible in an individual way. The inner assuredness in dealing with the matter in hand should become the starting point for the biodynamic approach to soil - plants - animals just as much as external points of reference.
These early thoughts were developed further by the Circle of Representatives. As regards the form, the working time-frame of three years was not felt to be absolutely necessary. It will be a good thing, if it comes about, but there has to be some room for manoeuvre as well. The dialogue form of the conference should be further developed; the new wave which started moving at the 2011 conference should not ebb away again. The question is how we can get into a process in advance of the conference on a wider scale, a process which will take hold of the whole movement more strongly. Mention was made of a more intensive collaboration with other anthroposophical fields of endeavour as a very promising way of working. The view was also put forward that art should have more space in the conference, on the one hand, and that art could perhaps be more developed and integrated to assist us in the entire range of endeavours of the movement.
As far as the focus on content is concerned, of the threefold harmony of earth – plants – animals it is the animals that have clearly taken the foreground. A few aspects of this may be mentioned here: In China, as an example of a non-European culture, animal husbandry and the whole approach to the livestock is something altogether different from that in the West. Cows and other ruminants are virtually non-existent. Maintaining grazing land is practically unknown. Accordingly the landscape is a different one. There are a lot of chickens and pigs. In a similar way the food culture with animal produce is different, as Thomas Lüthi vividly reports from his travels in China. How can the biodynamic principle of integrating the livestock be realised in such a situation? The shortage of food, partly predicted and partly already existing, comes from the fact that in the huge, upward moving economies such as China and India more and more people eat meat which is expensive. Thus the demand for agricultural raw produce rises greatly. In the world balance sheet that makes a significant difference. Livestock keeping will become a problem in this aspect, as is already the case with the discussion on climate change. What position do we take in this discussion? Can we continue to live out our approach to the integration of livestock in the farm organism unquestioningly, or do we have to think through livestock keeping
11 bound up with grazing land in a new way? With a lot of our farms, however, the fertility is based on a high stock of animals. Do we have experience of situations where people succeed in building up the soil in the long-term with a small number of livestock?
Besides such global aspects there are quite existential ones of Demeter farms existing in the present times. To put it briefly, we could say farms with livestock are suffering from having livestock, farms without livestock from not having livestock – the right balance is rarely to be found any more. I shall quote from an article from the circular which appeared in winter 2010/11 (no. 98): “Firstly, lots of new farms are joining, which are specialised in wine growing, fruit growing vegetable growing or cereals. Generations back the livestock were disposed of, the stables were rebuilt, the knowledge is gone, the daily and yearly life and work rhythm is ‘liberated’ from looking after livestock. The economic efficiency of these farms is based just on focusing on cultures and markets that demand this specialisation. Frequently, these farms find focused advice accordingly on rhythms, the application of preparations, disease management and the regulation of pests. They buy in the knowledge and substances and frequently their technically highly advanced practical approach succeeds. The new horizons and the visible changes in the first few years lead to high motivation on the part of the families running the farms. Whether it results in a personal relationship to the Agriculture Course and how quickly and how deeply this happens is very individual.”
“Secondly, lots of farms, on which cows are still there out of tradition, come to the existential question whether livestock keeping will continue to be feasible in future. A change in the generations, the necessity of building a new cowshed, a change in the possibility of places to sell, an enclosed farm position, etc., can all lead to this question. It is just on the small farms that getting rid of the cows can be a rational decision. In this the ‘social’ side is often critical: through the falling away of the round-the-clock care of the dairy herd a new free space arises, which opens up new and perhaps very timely possibilities for the individual, for the family, for social relationships. The ‘constraint’ of having to have co-workers is gone, the week-ends and holidays can be planned. Economically the sums can work out well, for milking seldom brings in net income. The cows and the contingents can be sold perhaps to a neighbour. For this farm the expansion and intensifying of livestock-keeping is just as much a precondition of the next phase in farm development as the extending for the farm opting out. And this means, because overall there are no fewer animals, no fewer cows and no less milk that particular farms specialise completely in livestock-keeping, specifically dairy cows. The machines make it possible and the factors of capital and labour require it. If a new cow shed is needed, then let it be a large one; if milking has to be done every day, then let us have lots of cows; if we have to have co-workers, then long-term ones, i.e. well-paid ones.”
From this situation the necessity arises for new forms of co-operation to be developed; on the one hand, within the chain of value creation, especially involving the consumers or the social surroundings in general. It is getting increasingly difficult to want to have a diverse farm only from the inside, from the farmers’ side. Increasingly it has to be wanted by a circle of people in the surrounding area as well. On the other hand, it is a
12 matter of co-operation between farms, each with their one-sidedness. How can manure and compost manure sensibly reach a farm without livestock? Is it sensible agronomically, how can it be carried out in a rational way, how is it to be managed financially?
As a third aspect with regard to animals there is a kind of social-psychological situation in our society. There is an exaggerated tendency to stand up for animal rights, right up to the point where people see animals as legal persons and give them their own lawyers. Anyone keeping livestock will definitely have got to know this slightly fanatical approach in an unpleasant way. A reasonable way of keeping livestock productively often appears to these people as latent mistreatment. The animals are felt to be the prisoners of human beings – a total reversal of the picture of the redemption of the animal through care, domestication and taming. The other side of it is that more and more people turn their backs completely on animals and, for instance, become vegetarians out of the sentiment “for me there should be no shedding of blood”. Here too the ethical picture of ‘brother animal’, which forms an essential part of all cultures, is turned completely on its head. Our relationship to animals seems like a touchstone for the state of our own human dignity: if animals are raised up as legal persons, human dignity is relativised, and if our sisters, the animals are repudiated, we are too. How are we to find our orientation? With our biodynamic approach, in particular, of understanding animals as organs of the farm organism as a whole, do we not have a practical-ethical starting point for the necessary orientation? In the Circle of representatives it was reported that in some places there are now concrete projects within the biodynamic movement, for example, to voice protests against the intolerable shredding of male baby chicks in the breeding of laying hens and to get away from it. It was also stressed that besides domesticated animals in the narrower sense we should have a look at all animals, particularly at insects so as to gain a fresh view of the fight against pests.
Then behind this the question about the evolutionary and spiritual relationship of animals to mankind comes into view. In the conversations of the Circle of representatives it was emphasised from various sides that there is an urgent need for a new advance in knowledge or a new quality in our knowledge of the animals. It calls for knowledge that is appropriate to this purpose to guide people’s feelings and ways of dealing with animals. Thus the relationship of the human being to the animals and the animal as a link from man to the soil, to the earth is in our focus. With regard to the earth, the relationship, in terms of Rudolf Steiner’s Agriculture Course, involves the way that the livestock not only bring astrality into the farm organism, but also the ego strength for the long-term development in the direction of a farm individuality. Have we grasped this? How can we embody it anew in our experience and understanding in a relevant way. With the relationship to man Rudolf Steiner describes, for example, in the third lecture of “Man as Symphony of the creative Word” (GA230) how the karmic debt of man towards the earth is being continually balanced out by the animals. At death people take the spiritual substance with them, which the earth was in need of and they leave the earthly substance behind, which burdens the earth. These imbalances are settled by the animals in their three-fold quality of animals of the head, chest and digestion, represented by eagle, lion and cow.
13 That is an outline of the new theme of the year, it is a question of new forms of co- operation and inner assuredness in the relationship to the animals. In this article the aspects mentioned were the global, the existential ones of the farm, the ethical- psychological and ones concerning knowledge. We summarise it as a suggestion in the formulation: What do the animals expect of us? O: What do the animals demand of us?
The Child of Europe Ueli Hurter
Two centenaries: 200 years after Kaspar Hauser’s birth and 100 years after the third Neuchâtel lecture
At the request of Hans-Josef Kremer to take an active part in the Demeter conference I travelled to Nürnberg at the end of October. It was the time of the first cold snap and of early snow in many parts of Europe. From my youth Nürnberg had been connected with the name and the figure of Kaspar Hauser. And thus it was a profound experience for me on Sunday 28th October in the early morning under a clear sky with cold air and in an autumn landscape, covered in snow, to walk through the town of Nürnberg and to linger a few minutes on the square with the house corner in view where Kaspar Hauser appeared at Whitsun 1828. The youth who emerged there from out of nowhere, so to speak, was for the first witnesses who picked him up a handicapped person; gait, posture, speech, ability to make contact – all of them present in their initial stages, but withered; having been arrested at a certain point in development. In the account from the early days which he spent in the watch tower and where he was visited by lots of people, but also by understanding people, e.g. the Mayor of Nürnberg, this handicap is outshone by impressions of profound human innocence, sinless purity, of archetypal humanity. And in those early days this strange person was given the name ‘Child of Europe’ by ordinary folk.
What is seeking to make itself known by this name of ‘Child of Europe’? How come reference is made to Europe here? What does Europe stand for in this connection? Let us try an approach to it: Europe stands for the middle between East and West. To be the middle, to hold the centre ground requires a special quality, which has difficulty in entering fully into life in a lasting and diverse way. All too easily the middle usurps the world around it as, for example, in the phase of world-wide imperialism by the European nations. Or else the middle is wiped out and West and East stand directly facing each other as, for example, after the Second World War. These two extreme examples illustrate Europe as an ‘all or nothing’ entity – however, with the name ‘Child of Europe’ something else was meant. The potential of a cultural region is indicated, which can give space to the middle between the forming forces of the west and the firing forces of the East through a measured relationship of inner and outer, of above and below.
Even in the depths of Europe right up to today there is antagonism at work, which has
14 difficulty in being the middle. The years of Kaspar Hauser’s life (1812-1833) are the years in Europe after Napoleon – the whole of Europe was supposed to become French, and we know the other side of the pendulum swing of history, in which the whole of Europe was meant to have become German. How difficult it is to find a balance along the Rhine, even today. And yet there is evidence of genuine European culture from this middle corridor from the North Sea down to the Mediterranean, as, for instance, the Parzival legend, of which there is a German and a French version or else the story of the Holy Odilia, who is venerated to the same extent, whether Alsace belongs to Germany or France. Neuchâtel belongs to this corridor, where Rudolf Steiner spoke about Christian Rosenkreutz in a most profound way.
It is probable that Kaspar Hauser had had a mission in the struggle for this heart of Europe. You can read all the clues of this mysterious life in such a way that he was the heir to the throne of Baden and was prevented from assuming and bearing this office by child-swapping, incarceration, release which was tried out and finally his murder (17th December 1833). ‘Child of Europe’ would then mean peace-maker, bringer of reconciliation, of balance after the war years of the Emperor Napoleon. Should Kaspar Hauser have been the heir to the throne (of Baden), then he was related to Napoleon.His mother Stephanie de Beauharnais was an adopted daughter of Napoleon and her marriage over to Karlsruhe was arranged by him. Thus Europe’s Prince of War and the Child of Europe stand opposite one another but really close together. What the one had too much of by way of formative forces, the other had too little of. That is the tragedy of Europe in the form of Kaspar Hauser that the social formative forces did not come to effect through him, but rather remained just a yearning. The child was not allowed to mature and do any forming, but remained the ‘Child of Europe’. Of course, caution is advisable, when you are according such a great mission to Kaspar Hauser retrospectively, though the further progression of European history with the years 1870/71, 1914-1918 and 1939-1945 is tragic enough to make you wonder whether Kaspar Hauser with his lifespan, which covered, in fact, the last years of Goethe’s life, was prevented from working productively on a social level for Europe.
After looking at Europe in the context of the world and the struggle for a balance of the European peoples with the example of France-Germany, we should, in a third step, look at the inner soul state of the European person. What does ‘Child of Europe’ mean with regard to the soul constitution? I believe we can formulate it generally for the present time as: what does it mean to be a ‘child of our time’?; where are we called upon to grow and develop in our souls from the call of our times? Rudolf Steiner speaks about this on 18th December 1912 – this is the third of the Neu Chatel lectures in a great cultural-historical esoteric context. In all the Neuchâtel lectures it is a question of Christian Rosenkreutz, his initiation, the manner of his working, his mission. There have been some reports on this in earlier circular articles. On 18th March 1912, thus exactly a hundred years ago and a hundred years after the birth of Kaspar Hauser, Rudolf Steiner describes a truly wide-ranging deed of Christian Rosenkreutz which had the effect that in the present time a current of evolution with the cross-fertilisation of the soul and the world is still possible. At the beginning of the renaissance there was the danger, as Rudolf Steiner portrays it, that people break down into two groups, you could say, European culture would have been split; on the one hand, people, who devote themselves entirely to the inner life, meditation and who outwardly are
15 incapable of anything in a practical sense, who have to beg in order to survive. This stream was there as a predisposition in human beings such as Francis of Assisi. On the other hand, you would have people, who are completely taken up with practical matters, purely utilitarian work, day in, day out, without any kind of inner culture whatsoever. The whole of life becomes a matter of mechanical utility, based on a way of thinking and feeling that was introduced by the Nicholas Copernicus’ mechanics of the heavens.
Christian Rosenkreutz recognised this danger and took on the task of averting it. Within the confines of birth and death, in earthly life there was nothing to be done. The souls come down to earth with their very one-sided disposition. Rudolf Steiner describes how the problematic influences on the souls that are striving towards an incarnation on earth occur on the journey through Mars. Accordingly, there had to be intervention on Mars. To this end Christian Rosenkreutz sent his friend, Buddha, to Mars and he worked there on Christian Rosenkreutz’ behalf. According to Rudolf Steiner, it is correct to say that Buddha had not been incarnated any more since 6th century B.C., but he, nonetheless, continued to accompany mankind on earth by working from the spirit world. Evidence of this is to be found in the heavenly mood surrounding the Nathan Jesus child in St. Luke’s Gospel. Therefore, we have the working together of two truly great individualities, Christian Rosenkreutz and Buddha.
For us this esoteric account by Rudolf Steiner is difficult to accept as an ‘outer’ process. If we regard the matter from the side of the inner soul, we have it easier perhaps. The fact that we, as modern people, are able to be active practically to the same extent as we are inwardly mobile is our inner experience of this effect. We find the whole value of our dignity as human beings and also the (European) heart of modern culture in the fact that we can think what we will and will what we think. I definitely believe the heart-warming and meaningful experiences in this relationship of outside and inside are predominant for most of us. The difficult moments, where we struggle and fight for the balance and correspondence between inner and outer, are in retrospect, looking back on our own biography, or seeing other biographies, these moments are really fundamental moments of our humanity.
In an authentic relationship of inner and outer something is expressed that one can call inner attitude. This attitude, which we can simply call the human attitude, is not something anyone is born with, each individual person must work for it for him- or herself, in point of fact, time and time again anew – a child of their own making. And also in a European context it must be struggled for again and again for this reason. In the background Napoleon, the prince of war, stands there, forcing everything into actions and Kaspar Hauser too, the child-like human being stands there, leaving everything as a promise, each of them admonishing us. With our humanity we face the challenge of overcoming “The Lethargy of the Heart”. Jakob Wassermann, the Kaspar Hauser researcher, coined this expression. He plumbs the depths; ‘the Child of our Times’, who lives mysteriously but also insistent in each of us, can become capable of surviving, capable of acting through the overcoming of the lethargy of the heart.
16 Reports from around the world Report on Italy Sabrina Menestrina
Since June 2011 the Italian biodynamic association (Associazione per l’Agricoltora Biodinamica) has had a new Council. This consists of seven people, of whom three are farmers.
Maybe the agricultural conference with Claus Otto Scharmer and Nicanor Perlas inspired us: four of us wished Italy to have a new, more dynamic biodynamic movement. We hope that this can be fulfilled to some extent through our being elected to the new Council. We all work on an honorary basis and each of us has full- time work. Our office is in Milan, where the Anthroposophical Society is situated. We meet each month either there or in one of the 16 regional sections (sic) of Italy.
It is our will to establish a closer and closer contact to the periphery so as to arouse new enthusiasm: twice in the course of the past year we have invited the leaders of the Section to a meeting to plan the future of biodynamics in Italy with them. Furthermore, two general assemblies of our approx. 600 members have been organised this year.
A lot of new things are happening with the further professional development of the biodynamic advisers and tutors: currently, we are working on a new form of training, a two-year course, which will take place on an experimental basis on intensive week-end courses and in each of the twelve different regions with particular themes emphasised. The aim is to create a new community of practical placements with experienced farmers, which, in the future, should support the development of biodynamic agriculture in Italy.
We have developed protocols and checklists to guide new biodynamic farmers: they are not just meant to attend a course, but each individual case is analysed and from the word go for two years they are accompanied by our advisers according to their individual needs (depending on the size of the farm, the crops and experience).
Our biodynamic society also creates this for the farmers who require the Demeter trademark. In Italy the biodynamic association and Demeter are separate, but they have significant points of contact, which are the necessary condition for a good partnership for the development and establishment of the high quality of biodynamic produce in Italy. Not everyone knows that in Italy 8,500 hectares of land and 318 farms are farmed biodynamically. Accordingly, Italy is the second biggest producer of biodynamic food, after Germany. Most of the produce is exported to Europe and across the world. The responsibility for the quality of biodynamic produce is therefore great. By quality we mean quality at the finest levels of matter, which can provide for all realms of human health, even for healthy thinking!
The new Council has organised two international conferences so far. The first was in November 2011 in Capua near Naples, South Italy on La Colombaia, a large farm that exports all its vegetable produce to England, Germany and France. This conference was
17 attended by Jean-Michel Florin and Martin von Mackensen. This conference – it took place in an area that is marked by criminality – led to the founding of the new section of Campania.
In Cavalese, near Trient, a conference took place on biodynamic preparations in November 2012. We wanted to revisit the sources of biodynamics, its essence, because it is obvious to us that only a little time is left to do something concrete for the earth. Martin von Mackensen was present once again. We successfully carried out two laboratories according to theory U. There were also some very impressive lectures, which had been prepared for these laboratories; thus there was one by the veterinary surgeon, Claudio Elli, on the significance of the sheaths of the preparations according to the Goethean method of observation, but also one by the scientist, Michele Codogno, on plants in connection with medicine and embryology. Tina Jacobaccio brought us closer to the theme through eurythmy gestures, Carlo Noro spoke about precision and diligence involved in the production of the preparations; Paolo Pistis spoke about the being of the farm organism in the contemplation and planning of new farms and gardens. Carlo Triarico, the President of the Italian biodynamic association spoke about the farm individuality; Antonello Russo, the President of Demeter Italia, spoke about the importance of frequent sprayings and the Demeter standard and Herbert Tratter spoke about some unknown elements that underlie the preparations.
2012 had a lot of other things in store for us! In January there was the four-day Anthroposophical Course that has been running for decades; the doctors, Matteo Giannattasio, Giancarlo Cimino and Peter Selg spoke about Francis of Assisi in comparison to Goethe and Rudolf Steiner and his modernity in connection with the Agriculture Course and its importance in the present day for the earth. In March there was the three day Nutrition course, again with well-known doctors, chefs and tasters. Every year we hold two agricultural training courses, in spring one for beginners and in autumn one for the advanced. In April a three-day visit for further professional development was organised to Carlo Noro’s establishment, one of the greatest Italian producers of preparations. We attended trade fairs with Demeter Italia, e.g.at ‘Vinitaly’ in March, in Verona and at ‘Sana’ in Bologna in September. In October in Milan the Italian version of Peter Selg’s Book Koberwitz – Pfingsten 1924 (Koberwitz – Whitsun 1924) was presented there were 200 people present! Some of this had been planned in the previous year and came about through the help of members of the former Council.
Every three months a newsletter appears (with scientific reports, brief pieces of information on courses, events and activities of the Section), which is sent to all members and beyond that to 5,000 other email addresses. www.biodynamica.org is clicked on by approx. 100 visitors daily. The website contains information about courses and events, the online- newsletters, but also the old ‘Bollettini biodinamici’.
The Italian biodynamic association is co-founder of the Italian version of Terre de Liens, Terre Future, which will start operating at the beginning of 2013. We are also a partner of Zukunft Säen (Sowing the Future), Seminare il Futuro, which took place for the second time on 27 farms in the whole of Italy. The Italian biodynamic association is not profit orientated and is supported by the
18 members. The annual contribution is around 70 Euros. We endeavour to convey to the members the importance of their support for biodynamics.
Report from China Thomas Lüthi
One of the Waldorf schools around Beijing has recently moved to a new site where all classes can be at the same place. The school has an orchard and some fields and the possibility to integrate gardening into the curriculum of the school. There is enough land in order to be able to keep some animals. Parents, teachers and other interested people listened to a lecture about biodynamic agriculture with great interest and involvement and many questions were asked. Good quality nutrition, GMO and the environment are now serious concerns for many people in China.
At the first biodynamic certified farm in China, Phoenix Hills Commune, a biodynamic course was held from September 19th – 28th with more than 40 participants. The background of the participants was very varied: agronomists, students, vegetable gardeners, some with CSA gardens, leaders of business enterprises and people having access to land e.g. as part of a restaurant or holiday bungalows. The leader of the biodynamic Bama project in the very South of China and another staff member from Bama attended the whole course.
In the middle of the course there was a two days forum with more than 100 participants from all over China. Steffen Schneider from the US talked about biodynamic farming and animal husbandry and Thomas talked about biodynamic principles, compost making, preparations and Demeter certification. Several participants were interested in Demeter certification.
A compost heap was built up in a most thorough way, with layers of different materials. People’s good clothing and shoes did not hold them back from moving all the materials around, such as plants and manure. The preparations were added with great respect. Cow horns were filled with manure. In the beginning chop sticks were used, but quite soon most participants changed over to filling the horns with manure with just their fingers. While having this close contact to the substance a very happy mood was spreading among the participants. The stirring of the preparations was demonstrated with a barrel and a stick, quite soon several participants practised stirring with just their arms. Enthusiasm and openness for new practices and thoughts was real.
While ongoing, the biodynamic course at Phoenix has developed into a two year training course. In total four different blocks are planned and two visit tours abroad.
One evening there was a meeting with the board of the Demeter China Association (DCA) that was founded last year, in order to follow up the activities of DCA. So far there were no members. Another evening there was information and discussion with the participants of the course about DCA. Possible activities of the Association were
19 discussed and the membership fee was decided during that meeting. Several participants filled in an application form the same evening in order to become members of DCA.
Another evening representatives from biodynamic initiatives were invited for mutual discussion and information. It became clear that the “biodynamic Demo farm,” belonging to Sun Island outside Shanghai no longer claims to be a biodynamic farm. The two people from Bama participated and informed us about the current situation at Bama. In the meantime their farm is recognised as being in conversion to Demeter.
Together with Li Yan, the initiator of Phoenix Hills commune, and Weihe Hu, the secretary of DCA, the main structure for a curriculum for the new training course was discussed and planned. Together with some staff members from Phoenix, chamomile and oakbark preparations were produced and buried at suitable places on the farm.
One evening there was a meeting with a business man working with agricultural products. According to his information, a growing number of successful business people in China are starting to bother about what they are working for. This man had contacts to the Ministry of Agriculture and wanted to know more about biodynamic agriculture.
In the Academy of Science in Beijing a lecture was organized about biodynamic agriculture and the history of BD in Europe.
Another businessman invited us to visit the South Chinese island Hainan. We paid a visit to a site for a new resort project in a most wonderful rain forest mountain area. The intention is to create an environmentally friendly nature project and to provide something socially for the local farmers. As part of the project, local farmers will be taught a form of organic agriculture, so they would have the possibility of converting their mainly very conventional rice cultivation. A meeting was held with the project leading team and there were discussions about the project and information was given about biodynamic agriculture. During lunch the day after, the Chairman of the company wanted to discuss the project and get information about biodynamic agriculture and Demeter. His wife showed an interest in Waldorf education.
From the work of the Section Is the international biodynamic movement a social organism? Ueli Hurter
These trains of thought are based on Rudolf Steiner’s so-called Oxford Lectures from 26th , 28th , 29th August 1922, GA 305
The above question arises when the Councils of Demeter International (DI), the International Biodynamic Association (IBDA)and the leaders of the Section meet as the IBDC. (See Thomas Lüthi’s report). Should we want to and be able to consider ourselves
20 a social organism, the question is how the life of this whole can be strengthened and fostered. If each organisation sees itself as independent, working together is not forced upon us; but rather each one will pursue it in as far as it serves its purpose.
What is for sure is that there is a historic biodynamic impulse. Yet as we well know, individualisation gives a basic thrust to this universal impulse and simply for this reason a principle of diversity faces the uniting formative principle.
Each of the three international organisations has its own history and identity; and in the various countries it often is so – whereby with this terminology regarding the Section the Circle of Representatives as an international body is emphasised more than the Section as part of the High School at the Goetheanum. The common roots are quickly forgotten in everyday life. The reasoning behind this is not so easy to grasp, but this is the voice of experience. In the beginning a new organisation needs nurturing and a strong identity, and it is also, in fact, an independent corporate body with its own statutes, members and finances. Later on it takes on a life of its own, which can be easily overemphasised, because new co-workers and new members get involved with each organisation and only gradually discover the aspect of this organisation as a part in relation to the whole biodynamic movement.
IBDC is endeavouring to strengthen the sense of solidarity and the vision of the movement as three-fold and not as divided into three. The basis of links has been clearly laid down in that there is reference in the statute of each organisation to the others. There are the initial stages of working together in a functional sense. Nevertheless, what does not yet exist is a common financial framework. Taking this question as his starting-point, Änder Schanck as a member of the IBDC has written a study, in which he has come to two conclusions.
Three-foldedness instead of Division into three Parts Firstly he emphasises the uniting factors and appeals to people to shape the future in the sense of structuring the international biodynamic movement as one organism instead of having an ongoing process of division. This has wide-ranging repercussions, and not only for the finances. Let us take a current example: should whisky get a Demeter trademark? If a suitable application is put on the list at DI, then there is a vote on it. The majority decision counts, whether it is yes or no. All democratic rules are followed. IBDA as the owner of the trademark asks in a focused way whether such products are compatible with the long-term identity of the trademark. The Section could face the task of working scientifically on the question of alcohol consumption in relation to the spiritual development of the human being. How will these viewpoints meet in the end? Who decides about what? It will require time and effort until we can guide and co-ordinate such a process in a differentiated way. Indeed, there are various examples of this kind and each case requires a process that is suited to it. This presents a great challenge for us all, summoning the will to find this common ground, for each organisation can function on its own. For years Thomas Lüthi has been the one in particular who, without tiring, has endeavoured to strengthen this element of taking each other into account.
21 Differentiated Labelling Änder Schanck’s second conclusion is social life is three-fold and the market reflects it. In other words, the market mirrors to us the fact that differentiated labelling is becoming necessary. The structuring of social life into cultural, legal and economic aspects is a fact nowadays , it does not have to be introduced by anyone first; of course, it is only expressed in a distorted way, because the form of modern organisations does not correspond to social life. As a biodynamic movement this means: 1. we share a cultural impulse, 2. we have organised ourselves legally 3. and we act in the economic field, which is our common ground.
Now what is happening is that we attempt to compress all these aspects into the one Demeter label. Consequently, this tends to be overloaded and to be unable to serve each of the aspects sufficiently. Therefore, bearing the future in mind, we must venture to think through our culture of mutual agreements and appropriate labelling in a differentiated way: in centre place a classic certificate or a seal for biodynamically certified agricultural production. Beyond this, we need to consider a trademark with a strong profile taking it further for those who want it, e.g. in processing and for social criteria; and as a third element, before having the seal of certification for the farm, a possibility for people to call themselves carriers of the biodynamic impulse in the cultural sense.
All these forms already exist in some shape or form because social life requires it. The question is whether we want to and are able to create this in the future, consciously taking hold of and shaping this differentiation. This is a very demanding task. A particular difficulty is presented by the fact that differentiating social structuring is foreign to the position of the farmer. Viewed from the farm, milk, for example, does not need any such very differentiated means of attestation and marketing. Milk is simply there and now needs to be consumed. The fact that the matter is so complex from the consumer side is all the same to the cow that provides the milk and to the farmer as well in a certain way. It is therefore a risk to the view the farmers of our movement have of themselves that we have, nonetheless, been accustomed to facing increasingly up to the demands of a complex society and in particular to the vehement thrusts of the economic forces.
Structuring on the Basis of Knowledge In summary we can see that, what is required, on the one hand, is the will to structure as a uniting force and, on the other, as a differentiating force so as to enable our movement to increasingly become a social organism in a real sense. We shall have to muster this will, for nothing happens of its own accord. However, it is also important that we do not act precipitously but first attempt to understand the social phenomena and forces underlying them. Now we have come to this point: it is a basic concern of Änder Schanck and ourselves as heads of the Section not to have these fundamental reflections misunderstood as a political paper, but rather be seen as an endeavour to penetrate the situation with our thinking.
22 International Biodynamic Council – IBDC Thomas Lüthi
Structure and Co-operation On 15th and 16th October 2012 there were discussions again in IBDC, this time in Darmstadt.
One of the main questions continues to be the structure and co-operation on an international level, which concerns, above all, the organisations, Demeter International (DI), the International Biodynamic Association (IBDA) and the Agriculture Section. To this end Änder Schanck had written a comprehensive document about the structure of the entire organisation of the biodynamic movement for this meeting; the current situation is carefully illuminated and cautious attempts are made to find the way forward to solutions. For more information on this see the separate article by Ueli Hurter. The main part of the meeting was devoted to these questions.
Strong alcoholic drinks Another question was the labelling of strong alcoholic drinks. At the Annual General Meeting of DI in Slovenia in June a proposal of the Council that strong alcoholic drinks may not be honoured with a Demeter label, was defeated by one vote. In certain countries such as Switzerland, for example, grappa (a brandy from grapes) is accorded a Demeter label. In Scotland whisky is being prepared in barrels and there is a wish to bottle it with a Demeter label. Many different viewpoints came out in the discussion; one was that there should be limits to the labelling of Demeter, for instance, with strong alcoholic drinks, tobacco, long-life milk etc. On the other hand, some people held the view that there should be freedom and the consumers themselves should be capable of making a choice. The decision of the DI Annual General Meeting holds good, but as a result of the conversation in IBDC it should be investigated what possibilities there are of using a label such as, for example, “produced from Demeter wheat”. In this way it would indicate rather the ingredients. This theme makes the whole question of labelling highly topical.
Advisory work The organisation of the advisory work on an international level was discussed. It is becoming apparent that there is a need for collaboration. The following obligations were emphasised: • The connection with the international work. • The connection with biodynamic associations. • Study of the essentials of biodynamics and the Agriculture Course. • Further training alongside other advisors. • Technical consultation according to the Demeter guidelines. • Supporting the farmers to form their own independent judgements and to act independently.
Best practice The question as to what should be laid down in guidelines and what should not keeps returning as a topical question. The tendency to lay down too many details, for
23 instance, with the production and application of the preparations does not correspond to someone acting as an individual in a sovereign way out of the knowledge of the current circumstances. In the dealing with the preparations in particular this question keeps coming back as a pressing one. The Agriculture Section has decided to put together and publish something on best practice in the form of a working manual on the production and application of the preparations. In it not only one possibility should be presented, but various approaches in different places and circumstances; intended as a help to people to form their own judgement.
Valgiano Group On 14th June over a hundred participants met in Italy to speak about the quality of the inspections and the quality of the preparations. The certification costs were felt to be too high. Alex Podolinsky was invited to hold a lecture. A work group has sent a proposal to DI and the national Demeter associations. The guideline committee of DI has compared it to the existing guidelines of DI and worked out an answer to the Valgiano Group, which will also be sent to the national Demeter associations.
The work in IBDC is seen as fruitful and necessary and a further meeting will take place in February.
Sending off the first biodynamic Ambassador Ambra Sedlmayr
At the end of November, finally, everything was ready. Melchior Pfeil, the first biodynamic ambassador of the Agriculture Section, packed his suitcase and flew to his ‘deployment’ in India. Melchior will help with building up a college there for biodynamic agriculture. The first students are already there; the farm and the teacher urgently need another pair of trained hands. We in the Section are glad to be able to support the project at this distance not only with encouraging words, but to know there is a trained, motivated and energetic person there. Thus we will have a quite different bond with the pioneer projects in distant countries; if we are able to assist them with an ambassador and look forward to receiving his reports, the projects will become a much more living concern to us. The project office thus concentrates its efforts and resources in order to make them available to where they are especially needed for the strengthening of the world-wide biodynamic movement.
The Landscape Project Jean-Michel Florin
Report on the Landscape Planning Week from 2nd to 7th September In Circular no. 100 (winter 2011/12) we presented the Landscape Project of the Agriculture Section. Now we are able to report on the first step – the Landscape Planning Week and its results.
24 The theme of landscape is not new at the Goetheanum. Since the 1980s there has been a group around Jochen Bockemühl – the former leader of the Science Section at the Goetheanum – that has developed and practised the Goethean phenomenological method for the landscape. The special thing about this work is that it always had a direct relationship to the cultivation of the gardens and always had concrete implications for the Goetheanum grounds. This method views the landscape as a living organism, its cultivation becomes a process of development. This manner of working on the landscape has spread across the whole of Europe, especially through the work of “Petrarca – European Academy for Landscape Cultivation”, which organises the practice weeks in various countries.
At the request of the gardeners of the Goetheanum gardens, who had the need to develop new concepts for the shaping of the North aspect of the gardens, a landscape planning week was organised together with all those responsible for the Goetheanum gardens. The new planning initiative was intended to adopt a participatory approach; on the one hand, so as to embed the gardens more in their social surroundings, on the other, to work out new ideas for landscaping with the help of experts from outside.
The Landscape Planning Week began with a day trip. First of all, all 28 participants who had come from six different European countries were to become familiar with the terrain or view it once more afresh from various perspectives. The four working days were each divided into three parts: in the mornings there were observation exercises and artistic courses to tune in, in work groups concrete landscaping themes were tackled. In the evenings people exchanged their findings in the World Cafe, followed by a plenary session. The results of the work groups were presented at the end of the week to invited guests.
The work in the various groups was based on their perception of the concrete local situation. Through encountering the landscape physically and perceiving it through their senses it was possible to describe the physical elements of the locality, the etheric (the dynamics) and the astral (the atmosphere). This was followed by a reflective and/or artistic processing of the experiences gained to form an inner picture of the whole; this led to ascertaining the individual quality of the place, frequently in connection with giving it a name. Thus the North-East area of the Goetheanum gardens was called ‘back-bone’, ‘no-man’s land’, ‘work yard’ and even ‘technical village’. These definitions leaped from one work group to another and soon became common property. As soon as this identity was defined, it was obvious that there is a light and a shadow side to it. Thus, the positive picture became the leitmotif for the future development, and various landscaping ideas could be integrated with regard to this vision.
The intensive occupation with the gardens has led to inner transformations with the people from here. Some stated that they have discovered new aspects or spots on the grounds. Beholding the landscape together, which involved the attempt to put oneself in somebody else’s position, meant that our own concepts were scrutinised and loosened up. These inner processes of transformation are important so that the grounds are seen with new eyes and thus new potential can be discovered for the future. The participation of outside people, who did not know the grounds or hardly knew them, was most helpful.
25 The next Steps On the basis of the new ideas the next thing will be to work out a master plan, which is to take into account the bedding of the gardens into the wider landscape; this will serve the future landscaping of the grounds. The social aspect will be further developed since a landscape is a reflection of the ideas and interests of the people who live in it. Thus we are working to ensure that the Goetheanum gardens are integrated more and more strongly into the courses and research projects of the Free High School for Spiritual Science. The conscious awareness for the significance of the grounds is growing and must continue to grow.
On the level of networking and co-operation with nearby residents and parishes we will continue working on the Naturkorridor (Nature Corridor)Goetheanumpark Project (from the Jura Forest through to the Birs) in connection with the IBA Project “from the South”. Furthermore, there are joint concrete projects coming about, like, for example, a wood shavings heating system and the continuation of the restoration of the Schwynbach (a brook) to nature. On the Dreiländereck level (the area where the three countries meet, CH, D and F) there is an interregional project planned on the ‘added value’ of the organic and biodynamic farms for the landscape and the culture this can then give impulses to other regions and countries.
The Vine project Jean-Michel Florin
Report on the wine-growers’ conference, 16th-18th November 2012 in Colmar and at the Goetheanum
The vine is not doing well at all at present. More and more wine-growers want to work biodynamically. Often they start with the ‘technique’, i.e. by applying the preparations and other biodynamic measures precisely; some follow the cosmic rhythms and attain visibly good results. Some world-famous wine-growers work biodynamically. Frequently there is a separation between farmers and wine-growers.
In order to strengthen the contact with the wine-growers and to work on the question of regeneration of the vine we in the Section decided to organise an international wine-growers’ conference with Demeter International. More than 100 people (wine- growers, advisers, wine experts, training course leaders, etc.) from 12 countries met for three days in Colmar (Alsace) and at the Goetheanum in order to consider the question together, how can the vine be regenerated and what can the biodynamic approach contribute to it? Key note lectures, exchanging experiences in bilingual workshops, intensive conversations and excursions helped us to delve more deeply into the themes.
Vines have become very weak. In earlier times there were vines that lived for a hundred years, nowadays a 20 year-old vine counts as old. This degeneration, which began 150 years ago with the vine pest (phylloxera) (all European vineyards were destroyed within a few years) is becoming more and more acute. Rudolf Steiner mentioned it in various lectures and explained that people tried to solve problems through the creation of new
26 problems (new American rootstocks from other sorts of vine). As with the bees people must start from scratch and develop a new vine culture in keeping with the nature of the vine. The first step means a radical change in thinking. This involves trying to understand the vine more deeply as well as its past and future roles for mankind (in connection with the role of wine). These fundamental considerations have led the researcher Georg Meißner to examine all practical measures involved: monoculture as a form of cultivation, vegetative propagation, the role of American rootstocks, methods of grafting, varieties, culture, pruning, etc. Examples of trials with wine-growing were shown with great natural biodiversity. The effect of biodynamic measures, especially preparations for spraying, was elucidated with lots of examples. The vine as a liana, which lives strongly in the periphery, in the surroundings, appears to be very sensitive to the preparations. Thus the effect of horn silica, for example, appears in the shine and in the strength of the foliage.
Niklaus Bolliger pointed out the way towards a new approach to growing vines: formerly vines were grown with the heart and by hand. For 200 years wine-growing has been devoted to reaching particular goals. Thus the vine was removed more and more from the elements of nature and its archetype (the use of cloning in tree nurseries). Now the question is being put, with what inner attitude is the vine to be grown in future and how can it be reconnected with its cosmic archetype? A great task for the future!
Another aspect is the social question, which was mentioned by Jean-Pierre Frick, the pioneer wine-grower. Starting from Rudolf Steiner’s lecture cycle “The Karma of Vocation of the Human Being in connection with Goethe’s Life” (GA172), he asked, what is the task in the vocation of a wine grower? Taking the grape harvest as an example, which is a help for lots of people, indeed can even be a therapy, he showed how the vine offers the possibility of forming relationships, if the work is not too mechanised.
In two workshops people worked on the process of making wine, above all, on the two burning issues of yeasts and the application of sulphur. In the first place it was not the aim to hand out direct recommendations, but initially to come to a deeper understanding of these beings and substances. The visit to the Goetheanum offered the opportunity of getting to know the place where Rudolf Steiner had worked and of showing the biodynamic vine cultivation within the framework of the biodynamic agriculture as a whole and agriculture as one of many impulses of Rudolf Steiner. The visit to the Goetheanum as well as a eurythmy performance provided a small impression of Rudolf Steiner’s impulse in art. The especially creative, beautifully served, delicious lunch combined with the above to make for a good, lively mood.
This conference, which was intended to be a first step on the way, has opened up several avenues of work approaches for the future. We shall carry on working in work groups on projects on the theme and will think about another conference to follow (perhaps in 2014).
27 Anyone interested should contact the Section: [email protected]
To find out more about the wine growers’ conference on our home page: www.sektion-landwirtschaft.org
The Nutrition Project Jean-Michel Florin
International Nutrition Conference at the Goetheanum (German, English, French) Alchemy in everyday Life, Nutrition Conference 7th-9th November 2013
Nutrition is transformation: from growing, processing and preparing food right through to eating and digesting – everything occurs in a process of movement and change. These often ‘alchemical’ processes form the quality of nutrition; how can we come to know and accompany them and make use of them in the nutrition of everyday life?
At this conference we want to especially take account of various aspects: • Fostering the extension of contacts with nutrition initiatives in different countries. So the conference will be offered in three languages and all the workshops will be offered in two languages. We hope to be able to develop a large network. In order to extend the contacts in the French-speaking region we had organised a Cooking Week in French in March 2012 for professional chefs in collaboration with the Lukas Klinik, Ita Wegmann Klinik and the Sonnenhof in Arlesheim. Because of the many enquiries this one-week course will take place from 10th-15th March 2013 once more in French. In future we would like to offer workshops in English and other languages too. • Fostering exchange. Co-operation and dialogue should be strengthened as an approach to encourage contact between people. • The connection between agriculture and nutrition. Agriculture and nutrition belong together: in the beginning there is a process, which leads from the living earth to the human being via the plants and the animals. Seen in this way, we ought to be always wondering, how can I transform the original quality, which is in the plants and animal produce, that it is truly an improvement? Every step, the quality of the seed, cultivation of the plant, harvest, storage, processing, cooking and eating ought to be a part of a process and the person eating it ought to become aware of where what he is eating comes from.
We hope that a lot of farmers will take part in this conference so as to work actively on this theme.
28 Report of the Excursions and Meeting of the Circle of Representatives in South Tirol from 30th October to 3rd November 2012 Jean-Michel Florin
Our arrival by train and bus was impressive because the first snow fall of the winter had freshly covered the landscape: only a journey across the pass was needed to bring us to Schlanders, where we arrived by night and in fog. South Tyrol was completely unknown to me up until then; I was full of expectancy. The next morning a magnificent landscape opened up: mountains covered in snow, golden larches and dark green spruces on their slopes; down in the valley below a sea of apple trees. For several decades South Tirol has specialised in apple growing (2,5 % of the area is under apple production). Schlanders lies in the southern Alps, in a wide valley, surrounded by mountain slopes and peaks, which are between 3,000 and 4,000 metres high. The landscape is marked by a dry climate (less than 500mm. precipitation annually).
Erich Vill, a member of the Circle of Representatives, had invited us to his place in Schlanders for the autumn meeting. He wanted to show us how ‘alliances’, the theme of the year, lives strongly in his village and the Vinschgau Valley. He had organised the meeting with his family and his co-workers. We were all accommodated in the Bio- hotel his son runs. Immediately next door, directly on the main road of the little town of Schlanders is the Vill Farm and Riding Stables. The family business with the hotel, farm and riding stables also includes orchards and vegetable fields, altogether 6.5 hectares. The orchards are mainly at the bottom of the valley, in amidst the orchards of the neighbours. The whole family works on the farm, in the hotel and with the horses. The older son is in the process of taking on the biodynamic cultivation of the orchards.
On Tuesday morning a refreshing walk took us high up the southern slopes of the town. This gave us the opportunity to arrive and to get to know the splendid landscape by being in it; steep slopes, barren rock faces, deep ravines and mighty waterfalls; strong contrasts, which definitely mould the people and have moulded them in the past. Everywhere the landscape reveals the work of human hands right up to the heights; for centuries people have channelled water in ditches and cultivated the slopes with terraces. Wherever it is at all possible fruit trees and vines have been planted. Erich explained to us the importance and significance of the water co- operative, which has strict rules and which every farmer must join. “One cannot achieve anything on one’s own, united we are strong” seems to be the motto of the Vinschgau people. Erich pointed out the two most important lifelines for himself and for the farm: water and the fruit co-operative, two alliances, without which he would scarcely be able to live. Solidarity prevails instead competition as with the tourist trade.
On Tuesday afternoon then there is a complete contrast in the programme! After the vibrancy of nature we experience the most modern technology in the GEOS Co- operative of Schlanders, where Erich delivers his apples. After trying to market them himself, he decided to rejoin the co-operative and thereby to market them along with the other farmers in the village. The GEOS Co-operative is equipped in the most modern way – you can sense that it is going well economically. The system of the village co-operatives, which was formerly well represented in a lot of countries (e.g. in
29 France) is still very much present in South Tyrol. GEOS has 320 members and a storage capacity of 7,000 tons of apples. It deals exclusively with apples, 80% of them Golden Delicious. We are provided with a lot of figures and we see the most modern technology. For example, in the great warehouse each apple is photographed 36 times from all sides – like a Hollywood star! - and then calibrated in 26 types. Then the apples are packed and loaded onto lorries. Unfortunately, the sorting criteria do not include firmness (proportion of dry matter) or qualitative methods, which would be able to show the particular quality of organic and biodynamic apples. They are almost entirely focused on external characteristics, which are used for sorting. It is important that the apples look beautiful. In conversation I find out an interesting difference between conventional and biodynamic apples. The conventional ones have the tendency to be completely round (effect of water), the biodynamic ones have a more angular shape (5 sides), which speaks for stronger formative forces. It would be interesting to carry out a morphological study, having regard to flavour, firmness, etc. in order to make the differences in quality apparent.
On Thursday in a talk on the Verband der Vinschgauer Produzenten, VIP (Association of Vinschgau Producers), in which approx. 1,800 producers (5,000 hectares) are combined, the director of the VIP explains the principles of the South Tyrolean co- operatives, which enable them to compete on the world market. The most important principle is the obligation of every farmer to deliver everything to the co-operative (without price guarantee, as the price depends on the quality of its apples as well as on the state of the market); that means the farmer must have trust. In return, he or she can concentrate entirely on the work and does not have to bother about the marketing. The farmer does not know at all where his or her produce is sold. As a large association (of many small farmers) the VIP can sell on the world market and has so much negotiating power that it can take part in determining the prices for the wholesalers. This system, which is strongly supported by regional politics, allows approx. 13% of the population to find or keep a workplace in agriculture, which works out as a much higher percentage than that of many European regions. A lot of young people take over their parents’ farms, because they can have a good living from them. A farmer with approx. 4 hectares of orchard has a turn-over of roughly 60,000 (Euros), 30,000 are production costs and the rest is for the work.
In order to understand the strong standing of farming you have to know that the politicians of South Tyrol, which is an autonomous region of Italy, have always supported the mountain farming assiduously. For example, agriculture remains almost completely free of income tax and the subsidies go to the small farms. It is clear to see how a system based on solidarity with the support from politicians can maintain and preserve the agriculture of a region. This offers a good impression of what Europe based on the regions could look like..
On the excursions we were amazed time and again how all hillsides, even the steepest ones, are farmed. Even on quite narrow terraces the farmers grow vines or fruit. The monoculture of the apple crops awakened a lot of questions. Only the apple monoculture makes it possible for sufficiently large quantities of apples to be produced and sold on the world market. The two aspects, monoculture and world market, seem to be mutually dependent on each other. The picture lingers on of a
30 considerable tension between the solidarity of a traditional community of farmers and really modern technology with powerful marketing methods.
The visit to Erich’s apple orchards on Friday showed us how he endeavours to grow biodynamic apples amidst diversity in amongst his fellow farmers, working conventionally. His well ordered plots are protected by large hedges; ponds, nesting boxes and green vegetation covering the soil actively nurture biodiversity of flora and fauna. The soil is fertilised with his own compost from the manure of his ten horses, which are sometimes able to graze among the trees after the fruit harvest.
Erich converted his farm to biodynamic cultivation in 1989. In the meantime four more fruit farmers, with whom Erich works together closely, farm biodynamically. 38 farmers who are farming biodynamically have joined to form the Osiris Co- operative in Meran; we were given a guided tour through it on Wednesday. There apples are sorted, stored, packed and sold, but also other fruit and vegetables. The variety is greater than by GEOS, the quantities smaller. The co-operative also has its own line of produce: fruit juices, apple concentrate, cleaning liquids from vinegar, etc. The head of the co-operative explained that nowadays everyone talks about efficiency and that it is hard to find people with idealism. The social commitment of the co- operative is something special, disabled people are involved in the work processes. “The presence of these people creates a relaxing atmosphere!”, as the chief executive put it. The price differences between organic and biodynamic produce are marginal. The co-operative is growing gradually, by one or two members each year. Growth for its own sake is not called for; a different economic model!
Afterwards the bus takes us to Franz Pfeifhofer’s farm. We have to walk the last part as the road is too narrow and too steep. A beautiful old farm from the 12th century, well looked after. The location of the farm is impressive. The vines are situated on very steep slopes, surrounded by deep ravines. The primeval force of nature is directly before our eyes. Franz, who has been farming his 3 hectares organically since 1990 and biodynamically since 2000, explains that he does all this himself, looking after the trees and vines, making the wine as well as doing the marketing. As the vineyards are so steep, it is simply working with your hands that is called for: grass cutting, the grape harvest, fetching compost. Since he has no livestock, he has founded a compost group with five other farmers; they collectively buy the manure of the Alpine cattle and then compost it and apply the preparations together. Afterwards, the matured compost is taken up the mountainside. With Franz too the community aspect is represented, even if it is on a different level. He tells us that he meets up with his fellow farmers in order to work on spiritual questions, as community makes you strong! After going to see the vines (above all, hardy varieties), we are allowed to taste the wines in the old cellar, where there is a pleasant aroma of yeast.
After lunch we visited the site where Tyrol Castle is built; yet another fortress on a steep mountain! The afternoon was concluded with a guided tour around the dairy co-operative, which processes conventional and organic milk. This place is also completely equipped with the latest technology. We hear once again that you must be one of ‘the best’ in order to be able to hold your own in the market.
31 As a conclusion to these two days of excursions we got together for a traditional, lavish supper in an awe-inspiring organic farm. A lot of farms offer meals for a limited time of the year, meals known locally as ‘Buschenschank’. The one condition is that they offer predominantly their own produce.
Subsequently the meeting of the Circle of Representatives lasted for three days in the Schlanders House of Culture. This building consists largely of marble which is quarried in the district. The walk from the hotel through the little town to the hall was agreeable. The meeting with some 30 participants was conducted in a good atmosphere. In the course of the three days the mood of working together could be enhanced, especially with the work on the Leading Thought “Gnosis and Anthroposophy”, on the new theme of the year as well as with giving greater depth to the task of the Section as an organ of the Michael School. Through the report from countries across the world everyone received a valuable insight into the world-wide biodynamic movement.
Throughout the five days a leitmotif gradually emerged with several of the themes: • The theme of building alliances was present from the start: it brought in a great openness with all concerned. Through the visits to the co-operatives it took on some nuances and became more clearly and richly differentiated. Erich and his family set us an example of this quality: completely integrated into village life, in contact with lots of individuals and institutions. As a biodynamic farmer Erich is self-assured without any tendency to want to instruct or lecture others; “live and let live” is his motto, an important quality for building alliances! The strength of alliance building was palpable when we visited the co-operatives. The question for the future is : how can people extend this power of solidarity in such a way that not only people with the same occupation or from the same region develop this sense of solidarity, but also beyond that? • The theme of the region as a relevant factor of significance for agricultural politics. We could well see how a strong regional identity and autonomy throw up a lot of advantages. Of course, there are also disadvantages, e.g. the danger of separation and separatism, as the Green politician and historian, Hans Heiss, has portrayed. • The theme of livestock was also present in the conversations, coming up time and again. (see the article on the next year’s theme by Ueli Hurter).
At the review one participant spoke of a sea change in the biodynamic movement: we are in the process of overcoming this tendency of ‘we and the others’; we notice that the others also have ‘beautiful blossoms’. For the alliance building there is no better preparation.
32 Agenda
Diary Dates Title Short Description 2013 13th-18th January Intensive Study Week By means of the U-process of Claus Otto “Shaping the Future. Scharmer questions from the participants’ Knowledge and Tools the work realm will be worked on in order to biodynamic movement” for plan a new entrepreneurial step. those with responsibilities in Dornach/CH
4th-6th February Circle of Representatives Meeting of members of the Circle of Representatives Dornach/CH 6th-9th February Agricultural Conference and Alliances for our Earth annual int conference of the biodynamic movement 8th-9th March Sektionskreis for Nutrition Preparatory meeting for the nutrition conference, Dornach/CH 10th-15th March Atelier d'alimentation Workshop for chefs on biodynamic dynamique nutrition, in French. Dornach/CH 29thJuly- Summer University Introductory weeks into Goethean science 10th August in English, Dornach and Lötschental/CH 5th-7thNovember Circle of Representatives Meeting of members of the Circle of Representatives Dornach/CH 7th-9th November Nutrition Conference Alchemy in everyday Life (German, English, French), Dornach/CH
The Circular letter is published in German and English by the Section for Agriculture at the Goetheanum and can be ordered free of charge.
Hügelweg 59, Postfach, CH-4143 Dornach, Tel. +41 (0)61 706 42 12, Fax +41 (0)61 706 42 15 [email protected] / www.sektion-landwirtschaft.org
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