Joe Maxwell is President of the Family Farm Action Alliance, formerly a state legislator Lieutenant Governor of Missouri, and is retired from the Army National Guard. He's also a family farmer, and has witnessed the shift from a functional capitalism to one that favors large monopolies at the expense of farmers, consumers, and the earth itself. He knows—from multiple perspectives—that consumer demand alone is not enough to make the shift toward a healthy food system. He lays out the problems—and some ways forward—as we look to a new presidential administration.

Camas Davis is executive director of the Good Meat Project and founder of the Portland Meat Collective. A decade ago, after she apprenticed as a butcher in southwestern France, she returned to her home in Oregon to find that there was a lack of education among consumers about meat—where it comes from, what parts of the animal they're eating, what's behind variations in flavor—and so she started the Portland Meat Collective, which educates consumers to understand and prepare meat. Davis is the author of the book, Killing It: An Education.

Jovan Sage is a farmer, chef, community organizer, entrepreneur, herbalist, doula, and wellness coach. Drawing on the knowledge of her West African and Indigenous ancestors, she is deeply engaged in healing on many levels--the soil, the body, communities caught up in the global pandemic, race relations--through deeply reciprocal relationships with the land and one another. Find out more about her work at Alchemist Jovan and Sage's Larder.

Filmmaker Sanjay Rawal's new documentary, Gather, explores how Native Americans across the U.S. are rediscovering their food traditions--and building on them in the context of present-day realities. We meet a world-class chef who returned to his roots and opened a Native cuisine-based restaurant in an old gas station; a young Lakota woman from a buffalo ranch who is combining her love of science and of her own culture; and a group of young men from Pacific salmon country who are reclaiming their fishing traditions within a worldwide indigenous context.  Gather screened at the Regenerate conference, and it’s available for streaming on iTunes, Amazon, and Vimeo-on-Demand.

LaKisha Odom is Scientific Program Director (Soil Health) at The Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research. A non-profit organization funded by the Farm Bill, FFAR is helping to fund the scientific research behind healthy soil practices so that more farmers can make the transition to regenerative agriculture and long-term sustainability and resilience.

Dr. Vandana Shiva is an environmental leader, scientist, and activist. Author of over 20 books, she’s founder and leader of Navdanya, a non-governmental organization and movement that promotes biodiversity, organic farming, the rights of farmers, and seed saving. Her latest book is, Reclaiming the Commons: Biodiversity, Indigenous Knowledge, and the Rights of Mother Earth, published by Synergetic Press. She's delivering the keynote address at the Regenerate Conference.

Roberto Meza was a multi-media artist and MIT graduate student when he went encountered some health challenges. He found that eating healthy greens restored his health and spirit so powerfully that he started apprenticing with a farmer and then moved to Colorado to start Emerald Gardens, a greenhouse-based farm that delivers microgreens to customers in the Denver area—and which brings a focus to issues of food sovereignty, equity, and building a robust local food system.

A-Dae Romero Briones is director of the Native Agriculture and Food Systems initiative at First Nations Development Institute. We talk about programs across the country that are helping native people build healthier food systems and to strengthen the traditions that have kept these systems alive even during the most devastating periods of colonization.

Zach Ducheneaux is a third generation family rancher on the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation, and he’s Executive Director Intertribal Agriculture Council. We spend the hour talking about how the current financing system for agriculture doesn't work for the people growing the food—especially in Indian country, where discrimination is still the norm—and how innovative new financing structures can provide a real alternative. Zach will be be speaking at Regenerate 2020.

Judith Schwartz is the author of several books, including Cows Save the Planet and Water in Plain Sight. Her new book, The Reindeer Chronicles: And Other Inspiring Stories of Working with Nature to Heal the Earth, is a riveting series of reports from all over the globe about people who are restoring landscapes and dealing with deeply entrenched conflicts that are exacerbated by their degraded ecosystems. She takes us to China, the Middle East, New Mexico, Mali, Hawaii, Spain, Norway, and other places where people are working with each other and working with nature--rather than against it. The results are extraordinary: healthy land, clean water, economic prosperity, and even climate change mitigation.