Tuesday, 29 April 2014 IWTO Conference in South Africa
Tear up rule book, Savory tells wool sector (Headline from EcoTextile News)
Alan Savory
Capetown – April 29, 2014 Only properly managed livestock will save the planet from the devastating effects of desertification – that was the message of keynote speaker, Allan Savory, on day two of this year’s IWTO wool textile event in South Africa. “The importance of this issue to your industry is just mind-boggling,” Savory told a wool industry audience which appeared alarmed and intrigued in equal measure by the renowned environmentalist’s unusually frank address. Brett Mathews reports from South Africa.
Editor: We will attempt to get full details of the presentation for later publication.
About Allan Savory from the IWTO web site
A native of Rhodesia, southern Africa, Mr Savory has devoted his life to preventing desertification – “a fancy word for land that is turning to desert,” as he likes to say. A research biologist and resource management consultant, his ground-breaking work on grassland ecosystems took him to four continents to further develop sustainable solutions, leading to the discovery of a surprising contributing factor in the process of protecting and reclaiming degraded land, and one which has huge implications for the wool industry: livestock.
For more than 25 years he and thousands of land, livestock and wildlife managers have been able to demonstrate consistent results following the methodology he calls “holistic management.” Mr Savory’s discussion at the IWTO Congress will feature the ways in which animals can be used to heal landscapes, combat climate change, restore economies, increase soil fertility, produce clean water, and provide healthy habitat for wildlife.
In addition to his work in holistic land management, Mr Savory served as a Member of Parliament in the latter days of Zimbabwe’s civil war and leader of the opposition to the ruling party headed by Ian Smith. Exiled in 1979, as a result of his opposition, he immigrated to the United States where he co-founded the non-profit organization Holistic Management International with his wife, Jody Butterfield. In 1992 they formed a second non-profit (social welfare) organization near Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, the Africa Centre for Holistic Management, donating a ranch that would serve as a learning site for people all over Africa.
Awarded the Banksia International Award in 2003 in recognition of his global-scale environmental work, his current projects in Africa continue to receive high praise. The Africa Centre for Holistic Management was announced the winner of the 2010 Buckminster Fuller Award for the organization working to solve the world’s most pressing problems.