Since 2000, the Water Conservation Conference offered by the Xeriscape Council of NM has become the national outdoor water conservation conference. The February 2008 conference attracted almost 400 registrants from 18 states. Over 35 city water departments were represented. Registrants have also attended from Mexico, Japan, Canada, and Argentina.
We have been able to attract and feature the world’s most renowned water experts. Global water/climate keynoters have included the late Sen Paul Simon, Sandra Postel, Peter Gleick, and Eileen Claussen. Others, speaking on related landscape and water, water and energy and sustainability have included Hunter Lovins, Peter Warshall, Gloria Flora, Schlomo Aronson, Robert Glennon, and Amy Vickers.
The 2009 global water keynote will feature Maude Barlow, the National Chairperson of The Council of Canadians, Canada’s largest public advocacy organization, and the co-founder of the Blue Planet Project, working internationally for the right to water. Our “Foodshed” keynote address will be by Wes Jackson, President of The Land Institute, who is leading the research to develop perennial grains. The Land Institute has worked for over 20 years on the problem of agriculture with a primary purpose of developing an agricultural system with the ecological stability of the prairie and a grain yield comparable to that from annual crops. Our increasingly current and relevant topic for 2009 is “Watershed – Foodshed”.
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