Conference on Food and Agriculture stresses interdisciplinary approach

WEINACHT, Switzerland -- The crucial and multi-faceted role of agriculture in maintaining human existence and well-being was the focus of the third annual meeting of the International Society for Agriculture and Rural Development (ISARD), held here at the Landegg Conference Center 22-28 November 1993.

Some 30 individuals from 10 countries participated in the conference, which featured the presentation of some 11 papers, 5 panel discussions, and video showings.

The topics discussed were wide-ranging, from technical briefs on soil mineralization to discussions of biotechnology and rural food marketing. Yet, according to participants, a distinctive theme emerged in the integration of ideas from a variety of food and agriculture-related disciplines -- an integration that some said is the hallmark of such Bahá'í professional meetings like this.

"The conference showed the connection between agriculture and health and nutrition," said Sally Jamir, an agriculture education specialist from the United States. "In the participants there was a wonderful combination of agriculturalists, medical doctors, nutritionists, people involved in community development, and farmers."

Ms. Jamir and others said that diversity of disciplines contributed greatly to the cross-fertilization of ideas in all of these fields.

"For Bahá'ís, what is important is to consider the many faces of the community, and how they all interact and relate to one another," said Ms. Jamir. "The Bahá'í approach would be to see that on some level, doctors and farmers must interact, in order for each to have a more concrete understanding of what is healthy food and where it comes from and how locally grown food can contribute to the community's health and well-being."

Iraj Poostchi, the conference coordinator and an agricultural development specialist from England, said in the papers and presentations made at the meeting were the seeds for a new vision of world agriculture.

"Agriculture is really the foundation of the world's economy," said Dr. Poostchi. "No other industry has so many people involved in it worldwide."

Dr. Poostchi and others said future agriculture has to be from the grassroots on upwards, focused at the village and farm level, and not from the top down. "The current system of subsidies for agriculture can't be sustained," said Dr. Pootschi.

Alfred K. Neumann, a professor of public health, and Geraldine S. Robarts, a community development worker, said "a multi-faceted, family- and community-based approach to rural development is called for, an approach that includes health and nutrition, income generation and management, social components including equality of the sexes, universal education, open and equal consultation, and moral, ethnical and spiritual teachings and discussion to guide the wise use of new income and to promote family and community unity and stability."


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