Speakers

Confirmed speakers include:


Helena Norberg-Hodge (Australia) is the founder and director of Local Futures. A pioneer of the new economy movement, she has been promoting an economics of personal, social and ecological well-being for over 40 years. She is the producer and co-director of the award-winning documentary The Economics of Happiness, and is the author of Local is Our Future and Ancient Futures: Learning from Ladakh. She was honored with the Right Livelihood Award for her groundbreaking work in Ladakh, and received the 2012 Goi Peace Prize. Helena is also a founding member of the International Forum on Globalization, the International Commission on the Future of Food and Agriculture, and the Global Ecovillage Network.
Dr. David Suzuki (Canada) is a scientist, broadcaster, author, and co-founder of the David Suzuki Foundation. He is Companion to the Order of Canada and a recipient of UNESCO’s Kalinga Prize for science, the United Nations Environment Program medal, the 2012 Inamori Ethics Prize, the 2009 Right Livelihood Award, and UNEP’s Global 500. Dr. Suzuki is Professor Emeritus at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver and holds 29 honorary degrees from universities around the world. He is familiar to television audiences as host of the CBC science and natural history television series The Nature of Things, and to radio audiences as the original host of CBC Radio’s Quirks and Quarks, as well as the acclaimed series It’s a Matter of Survival and From Naked Ape to Superspecies. In 1990 he co-founded with Dr. Tara Cullis, The David Suzuki Foundation to “collaborate with Canadians from all walks of life including government and business, to conserve our environment and find solutions that will create a sustainable Canada through science-based research, education and policy work.” His written work includes more than 55 books, 19 of them for children. Dr. Suzuki lives with his wife and family in Vancouver, B.C. Read more at http://www.davidsuzuki.org/david.*David will be joining the conference remotely via video.

Dr. Michelle Maloney (Australia) is a lawyer and change maker working to ensure human societies live within their ecological limits, respect the Rights of Nature to exist and thrive, and build effective economic systems that support social justice and ecological health. Michelle is Co-Founder and National Convenor of the Australian Earth Laws Alliance (AELA); Co-Founder and Director of the New Economy Network Australia; Director of Future Dreaming Australia and Adjunct Senior Fellow at the Griffith University Law Futures Centre. Michelle is passionate about building diverse, local economies in Australia, that ensure we can all be part of a fairer and more just society and that we can thrive within healthy, biodiverse bioregions.

Charles Eisenstein (USA) is a speaker and writer focusing on themes of human culture and identity. He is the author of several books, most recently Sacred Economics and The More Beautiful World our Hearts Know is Possible. His background includes a degree in mathematics and philosophy from Yale, a decade in Taiwan as a translator, and stints as a college instructor, a yoga teacher, and a construction worker. He currently writes and speaks full-time. He lives in Pennsylvania with his wife and four children. Read more about Charles at http://charleseisenstein.net.

*Charles will be joining the conference remotely via video.

Damon Gameau (Australia) is a director, producer, activist, author, and nominee for Australian of the Year. In 2015 he released his first feature film That Sugar Film, which became the highest grossing Australian documentary across Australia and New Zealand of all time. It has received awards from around the world including the 2015 AACTA Award for Best Documentary. The accompanying book, That Sugar Book, was a best seller in Australia and has since been released in over 20 countries and 8 languages. Damon has recently completed the documentary 2040, which has also become one of the highest grossing Australian documentaries of all time. The 2040 ‘Regeneration’ impact campaign has brought many of the solutions shown in the film to life and has motivated people to take positive action on climate change. The film continues to be shown in schools, within corporations and at Parliamentary levels. It will be released globally in late 2019 and early 2020 along with the accompanying book 2040: A Handbook to the Regeneration.

Manish Jain (India) is a leading voice for the regeneration of diverse local knowledge systems, cultural imaginations, and the deschooling of our lives. He is the Co-Founder and coordinator of the Udaipur-based Shikshantar: The Peoples’ Institute for Rethinking Education and Development, and the co-founder of some of the most innovative educational experiments in the world: Swaraj University, the Jail University, the Creativity Adda, the Learning Societies Unconference, the Walkouts-Walkon network, Udaipur as a Learning City, and the Families Learning Together network. He recently helped to launch the global Ecoversities Network. Manish is the editor of several books on learning societies, unlearning, gift culture, community media, and tools for deep dialogue. Read more about Manish here.

Berry Liberman (Australia) is the co-founder and creative director of Small Giants, an Impact family office based in Melbourne, Australia that invests in and nurtures businesses working towards a more just, sustainable and compassionate world. The Small Giants family of businesses includes Impact Investment Group, B Lab Australia, Peace Factory, Mossy Willow Farm, The School of Life Australia and Dumbo Feather among others. Berry is also the publisher of Dumbo Feather, a multi-platform media company that publishes long-form conversations with extraordinary thinkers and doers across the world. She believes the stories we tell have a profound effect on the lives we lead and the world we live in, and is passionate about creating spaces and communities that foster robust, substantive conversation.

Erfan Daliri (Australia) is an author, activist and social change consultant with over a decade of experience across participatory community development, youth empowerment, refugee and settlement services, community engagement and human rights advocacy. He is the founding director of Newkind Social Justice Conference, an advisor to Amnesty International Australia, and is currently completing his Masters in Communication for Social Change. Erfan is particularly passionate about working with community organisations and empowering people from diverse communities to affect social change while working towards gender equality, environmental protection and sustainability, social harmony and economic justice. His latest book, Raising Humanity, discusses the underlying causes of inequality and socio-economic injustice. It is a discourse on our ecology and our economy, resilience and community, and what it takes to be a changemaker.