Continuation of an Email Interview with Robert Karp

by Rebecca Briggs

Originally published in the Summer 2009 issue of Biodynamics. Robert Karp came on board as the Association's new Executive Director this spring. His first interview installment was published in the Spring 2009 issue.

Robert, in the past few months you've been talking and meeting with various regional and national stakeholders in the biodynamic movement. As you've announced, you plan to continue this process for the next year or so. But what are your initial thoughts and reactions to these conversations?

The meetings with members and friends have been tremendously inspiring and energizing. They have confirmed a number of my initial intuitions about the movement — for example, that there is a great deal of vitality and diversity in the movement right now. An incredible mix of people of all ages, with very diverse skills and interests, are being drawn to the biodynamic movement — from chefs to community activists, from filmmakers to farmers. I think it is the holistic vision of biodynamics that allows such diverse people to find a source of inspiration in it.

People seem so appreciative that I am making these visits. They want to feel a connection — a chance both to give input into the national association (BDA) and to receive new ideas and impulses from the wider movement. The meetings have been characterized by very warm and earnest conversations about biodynamics and the wider world situation and the work of the BDA.

Besides meeting with biodynamic groups, I understand you have also visited specific farms and initiatives. What has that been like?

Yes, I’ve been to Cresset Farm in Loveland, Colorado; to the Turtle Tree Biodynamic Seed Initiative in Copake, Massachusetts; and to Live Power Farm in Covelo, California, to name a few. Our members have launched some very ambitious and important undertakings, and it has been moving to witness the incredible amount of dedication and sacrifice that has been made on behalf of biodynamics. In general, I would say many of these initiatives are facing a challenge in moving from the founding stage of their farm, business, or initiative to a more sustainable phase of development. It is so easy to get isolated in the face of these challenges. I experience people as hungry to get some support for their endeavors from the national association, and I am trying to meet some of this need. Frankly, if I had the time, I could work full time traveling around the country and providing technical assistance and support to groups that are trying to move forward their biodynamic undertakings.

With this in mind, can you expand more on your vision for the biodynamic regional groups?

Our members need a human community of support and cooperation to realize their biodynamic aspirations. They are finding this support more and more through their local and regional biodynamic groups and through national interest groups like the “Future of the Preps” group. I can see more and more of our work happening in partnership with these local, regional, and national groups. Through this enhanced cooperation, I feel that we can become a true association, a free community of local, regional, and national groups who wish to affiliate in order to grow the biodynamic movement.

As I see it, our bread-and-butter work is to help our members help each other succeed in their biodynamic endeavors. We can do this by working more closely with these groups. These groups have their own initiative and set their own direction, but they are looking to the BDA for support in a number of key areas.

I think we have to get clear what it means to become an affiliated group of the Association. What are the services a group or emerging group can expect from the national association, and what are the rights and responsibilities of an affiliated group? This has never been properly worked out. I anticipate starting to work on this later this year already with some group leaders from around the country. It needs to be very clear how one forms a local, regional, or national chapter of the BDA.

You mention services that the BDA could provide groups. What might these be?

There is a lot of support people are seeking that we could provide. For example, we can provide guidance to new groups coming into being, and we can help existing groups grow or manage their growth. A great way to do this would be to organize events that bring together the leaders of local, regional, and national groups so they can share best practices with one another and so they can build connections and develop new forms of cooperation with one another. We need a forum where the more mature groups can help mentor the younger groups. I could envision an annual meeting, a kind of annual congress of biodynamic group leaders.
We also need to offer groups social networking on the internet and web space so new people can find them and so they can easily share ideas and documents with one another. This is easy, basic, but it is so important for the success of these groups. This will also make it easier for our members who want to get connected to one of these groups to do so.

This sounds like exciting and meaningful work for the Association to undertake. In what specific ways might a social networking initiative be put into action?

Well, for example, I anticipate that in the future a new national interest group will form among on-farm educators who are running programs for children on farms and who are working out of the wisdom of biodynamics and the developmental insights of Waldorf education. This is a strong emerging interest group in our movement, and we need to serve its work. We need to help convene these folks on regional basis so they can learn from one another. And anyone who visits our website should be able to find the individual web page for this interest group and should be able to get connected up with them easily if they are interested. I anticipate many new national interest groups like this forming.

You also mentioned providing groups with assistance in organizing events. What might that entail?

I think field days will be big in the future, and regional conferences and workshops and speaking tours. This is an area where much fruitful work can be undertaken through a partnership between local members and groups and the BDA. We also need to be able to offer infusions of seed money and technical assistance at key moments in the life of a group. At a more mature stage, we need to be able to offer groups the possibility of bringing their checking account under the BDA's 501(c)3 status. We will probably pioneer this with the Biodynamic Association of Northern California (BDANC) in the coming year. Finally, we need to offer groups transparency and participation in the BDA. This may mean having a role for regional representatives on our board and the opportunity to participate in our strategic planning. Our members want to feel that this is their association and that they are helping shape its direction.

I hope this gives you a taste. Ultimately, I anticipate we will need to have staff and offices on the regional level that can support the work of the movement on a region-by-region basis. This is really the direction in which we need to move to be effective.

Speaking of future effectiveness, we've been discussing ways to reach out to the younger generations. How do you think we will best connect with them?

Meeting the young people in our movement has been the most exciting part of my travels the last few months. I am so inspired by the energy and wisdom and maturity of the upcoming generation.

One of my first initiatives with the Association will involve helping to organize a biodynamic youth conference. I call it a youth conference because, while I anticipate it will have a lot to do with beginning farmers and apprentices, I also find that there are lots of young people coming toward biodynamics and toward agriculture in general as part of their quest to find themselves and to work toward social change. But they are not necessarily sure they want to become farmers. I want to form a planning team for this event with young people I have met across the country, and I anticipate using it as a springboard for the formation of an ongoing social network of biodynamic youth and apprentices and beginning farmers. I anticipate partnering with the Greenhorns, the Youth Section of the Anthroposophical Society, and many other groups in this effort.

There seems to be quite a bit of momentum for young people in the general sustainable agriculture world. Do you think there are particular challenges to bringing them more into the biodynamic movement?

Biodynamics as a set of complex ideas or theories, I don't think it is going to mean a lot to a young person on its own. Rather the ideas must be encountered through the direct experience of a farm, of a community, of real people they can work with and learn with and identify with. This is why growing our fledgling biodynamic apprenticeship program is so important.

If a young person encounters a genuine community on or in connection with a farm where the biodynamic ideas are really living in people’s hearts and wills and in the land itself, then they will breathe in the biodynamic impulse as naturally as they breathe the air. This is the starting point. On this basis, then, it can also be meaningful to provide the opportunity for them to connect directly with the spiritual insights that stand behind biodynamics. But we need to learn from the young people themselves when and if and how to bring them this content. There is a delicate balance here, which our best teachers and mentors know how to strike. And this balance looks different on every farm, in every region, and with every group of young people. As a movement, I think we have a lot to learn about how to strike this balance. It is really a pedagogical question.