Dear friends from Ecovillages worldwide,
I want to inform you about our Third Water Symposium in Tamera.
Water is a topic for everybody on this planet - and for sure for every ecovillage. Many ecovillages face severe challenges like salizination of ground water, treatment of sewage water, clean drinking water, and water for agriculture. Other challenges are the privatization of water, big dams and laws that in many cases support rather industry and centralization than decentralized models.
And many ecovillage have worked on regional solutions, sometimes they created model solutions that can and should be shared with others to help each others.
For this we organize this Water Symposium. Read more below. And please spread this information to all those who may be interested.
Leila Dregger, Tamera
"Renewing Water Cycles, Healing the Earth, Learning from Water”
3rd International Water Symposium, Tamera, Portugal June 6th -9th, 2013
"Water, energy and food are freely available for all of humankind, if we don´t follow the laws of capital but the logic of nature." (Dieter Duhm)
Water is life. Water is information. When the large water cycle of a landscape is intact then the land, nature, economy and people flourish.
But today water is dammed, led away, privatized and made to a commodity. One billion people currently lack access to clean drinking water. Desertification, floods, rising sea levels, forest fires, and droughts are to a large extent due to disturbed water cycles.
But even today the large water cycle can be regenerated. Worldwide people and initiatives develop regional solutions for the global water crisis. They learn to treat again water as a living being, which needs to move and to connect. They develop methods to enable the earth body to receive water and to make the soil fertile again. The example of Tamera itself shows how a decentralized and natural water retention landscape can heal a region which is threatened by desertification and build the conditions for a modern subsistence and regional autonomy.
For the 3rd Water Symposium we invited international experts, activists and policy makers to exchange their knowledge and build a powerful alliance to protect water.
Topics
- The Tamera Water Retention Landscape as an aswer to desertification and globalizaton and other concepts for water retention
- Holistic planned grazing
- Climate change adaption and water management
- Resistance against dam building and water privatization
- Solutions for Groundwater salinization
- Living Water Quality
We want to focus on the plan to build a regional model "Alentejo," which is able to stop the ongoing desertification in Southern Portugal and create a sustainable food sovreignty. In this way, a model for the world could develop in Portugal.
With contributions by:
- Prof. Filipe Duarte Santos, Climate Change Adaption, Lisbon
- Dr. Míllan Míllan, meteorologist, Valencia
- John Liu, environmental film maker, USA/China
- Bernd Müller, head of the ecology department, Tamera
- Sally Silverstone, Biosphere 2, USA
- Sabine Lichtenfels, co-founder Tamera
- Joss Brooks, Auroville, India (to be confirmed)
- N.N., Savory Institute, USA (to be confirmed)
- Sergio Maraschin, Transition towns, Portugal (to be confirmed)
- Jerry van den Berge, Initiative for the Right of Water and Sanitation, NL (to be confirmed)
- Bernd Kröplin, the Memory of Water, Berlin (invited)
- Jürgen Kleinwächter, inventor, Germany
- Horst Wagner, inventor, Germany
- Paulo Mellett, Lush, UK (to be confirmed)
- N.N., Water as an element of Peace and Reconciliation, Middle East
It will be possible to use the 10th of June, the Portuguese national holiday, for post-symposium workshops.
In the name of a future worth living!
Welcome.
Cornelia Scheidl, event coordinator
Since 2007, a water retention landscape is being built in Tamera - combining landscape healing, alternative water management, and organic food production to a convincing model for ecological and economical sustainability. The next concrete step will be to plan a regional model, “Alentejo,” through which the ongoing desertification in the south of Portugal can be stopped, and a sustainable food autonomy can be established. In this way Portugal could become a model for the world. Since the 2nd water symposium of April 2012, the water landscape in Tamera and its surroundings has been expanded. Cooperation has begun, both among the participants and with shared projects, for example in Kenya and India. You can learn more about last year's 2nd Water Symposium on our website. The symposium begins at 6pm, on June 6th and ends at 4pm on June 9th. It will be possible to use the 10th of June, the Portuguese national holiday, for post-symposium workshops. In the name of a future worth living! Welcome.Cornelia Scheidl, event coordinatorGlobal Ecology Department Tamera
Film: Water is Life - the Water Retention Landscape of Tamera
Download the Invitation (pdf-file)
Venue: Tamera - Peace Research Centre, Monte do Cerro, 7630-392 Reliquias , Portugal
Language: English
Symposium Fee: 185,- Euros
Price for Portuguese participants: 95,- Euros
Youth price: 95,- Euros
Price for Lodging and Board: 105,- Euros
Price for Portuguese participants: 55,- Euros
Youth price: 55,- Euros
Lodging: dormitories or large shared tents
An apartment in the Guest House can be booked at an additional cost.
Board: vegan full board
Registration: office(at)tamera.org or +351 - 283 - 635 306
More information: Global Ecology Departement: +351 283 635 314
Mail: global.ecology(at)tamera.org
