The human population of developed,
industrialized countries of especially North America and Western Europe seem to
be increasingly suffering as a result of overconsumption, overproduction,
proliferation of waste and near idolatry of materialism. Despite the cultural
popularization of sensibilities related to and awareness of environmental
conservation, the vast majority of people continue to maintain lifestyles that
are disconnected from any deep-rooted relationship with the earth.
I was born in 1986, in Omaha, Nebraska which
makes me a millennial from the Midwest. For the majority of my life, I lived in
a community of people who are literally surrounded by farm life and
agricultural endeavors, and yet they are commonly unhealthy and overweight. It
is culturally acceptable to over consume food, align one’s identity with
oversized motor vehicles, and generally avoid outdoor activities. I was
encouraged to celebrate athletic achievement by crowding around the television
to watch the Cornhuskers of University of Nebraska while drinking beer derived
from wheat, or carbonated water sweetened with high fructose corn syrup, and
eating highly processed or fried food products usually derived from genetically
modified corn. I have witnessed the physical, emotional and spiritual decline
of many of the folks and their family members that I grew up with. Many who
suffer from obesity, shun physical exercise and are at risk of or have been
diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. They struggle to get through life, have
difficulty affording the pharmaceutical treatments needed to just get by, and
yet they continue to practice their downward spiral into what appears to be an
abyss of unconscious disconnection from the earth and its resources that have
supported our communities for generations. As I contemplate my post graduate
pursuits and possible professional ambitions, I find myself unable to avoid a
recurring set of questions in my mind. How could the pursuit of profits so
rapidly eclipse the fundamental purpose of farming? How could our communities
become so overrun with mindless overconsumption of food and a collective
fascination with materialism that has set us on a course of calamity of such
colossal proportions? How is it that the families I grew up with, who have
passed down farms for generation after generation, are unable to sustain
themselves, let alone our community or our planet? I feel drawn to ask what
innovations in technology, products, services and business models might be
explored and developed that could help reverse these catastrophic trends and
right the wrongs that are literally killing the people I know and love, and the
planet that we have inherited from previous generations.
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| Talia Eisenberg Omaha, Talia Eisenberg Henley |
As a result of a statistically improbable
quirk of fate, my paternal grandmother, Bella Eisenberg, encouraged my brother
and I to join her on many international journeys that allowed me to explore the
world far beyond Omaha at a very young age. She was one of the only survivors
in her family to avoid extermination in the Holocaust, and she immigrated from
Austria to Omaha in 1945. She married her first love (Erwin) and they settled
in what must have seemed like one of the safest places on earth, Nebraska, to
open the first modern art. Bella lost her husband in the 1970’s, but she never
lost her love of travel. Driven by her personal love of art, camaraderie with
artists and local cultures, and her desire to expand her collection, my
grandmother seemed to always be reading about or planning her next trip to
Europe, Asia or Africa with her girlfriends. By virtue of her passions and her
dedication to expanding my horizons and appreciation for other cultures, I have
enjoyed the privilege of frequent travel from a very young age and have visited
5 continents and 10 times as many countries. In my early adult life, after
losing my grandmother, I have continued to pursue my passion for travel and
exploration of many diverse cultures around the world.
My personal travels have taken a distinctly
more adventurous agenda, and I have explored many developing countries in
Africa and South America to learn that the natural world of plants and plant
medicines offer many specific healing properties to previously incurable
diseases which Western science can’t quite figure out. After immersing myself
in the practices of tribal communities from the West-Central African country,
Gabon, or the healing arts of the Shipibo tribes of Amazonian Peru, I have come
to passionately believe that for nearly every problem that plagues the people
of the “first world countries” there is a natural solution that already exists
yielding fruit from the earth, we just have to avoid killing it and somehow
find it. This takes exploration, organization and the audacious hope and faith
in a brighter future for ourselves and for our planet.
Being from Nebraska, where farming is as
common as Facebook, where soybeans are still more popular than Snapchat, I have
often anxiously wondered about the family farmer’s fading connection to the
earth. My close friend from childhood is now a PhD candidate in Psychology at
the University of Chicago. We were both vegetarians in middle school, partly to
annoy others and partly because of burgeoning environmental sensibilities. We
were each dedicated dietary deviant’s in Omaha. Beyond our friendship, she now
represents an important shift in personal values for a growing number of our
generation. She refuses to have any part of her family’s massive livestock business
because of how much waste is produced, water is wasted and destruction it
wreaks on the earth and the bodies of the people who consume the burgers that
result from their mass production. We grew up with the internet, and a
proliferation of non-traditional sources of information from a mushrooming
network of global resources. Our adolescence was punctuated with interests in
holistic treatments, alternative spiritual practices and often overlooked views
of the healing properties of plant medicines. We have witnessed the growth of
the natural foods and cosmetics markets with excited curiosity and these trends
have been the basis for many conversations about entrepreneurial fantasies. My
mind has always gravitated towards the potential opportunities for the
development of plant-based medicinal innovation and the possibilities of new
products that might help heal the sick. I was then and I still am fascinated by
the intelligence beyond human capabilities to cure physical and spiritual
maladies. Science has limits, in my opinion plant knowledge is infinite and
naturally solution-oriented. Have you heard of the scientific theory that
animals were conceived by plants long ago to move seeds around as a solution to
their inability to migrate across environments on their own?
It’s becoming more apparent that the modern
health care system has fundamental flaws and some even regard it as a complete
failure. Instead of curing disease, the most common healing technologies often
serve as a “band aid” or leads to continuous dependency with a heavy dose of
side effects. The source or root issue of the disease too often doesn’t get
cured or even properly diagnosed. Many of the sick and suffering have abandoned
their faith in their first world doctors and are travelling to place like the
Amazon to benefit from the practices and recommendations of tribal shamans who
combine spiritual practice with plant medicines. While many of these people do,
in fact, experience symptomatic improvement these are all too often lost when
they return to the toxic environments of their modern home life.
Simultaneously, I am deeply troubled by the
impact on indigenous people by the proliferation of wireless access to the
global internet and the popularization of materialistic measures of modern “success.”
In my recent years of travel into the jungle of the Amazon, I have personally
seen how the cultural influences of the industrialized countries are flowing
fast into the minds of locals, and I am distressed to see how their reverence
for traditional spiritual practices and their dedication to passing on personal
knowledge of plant medicines is being diluted, and becoming increasingly more
endangered.
In my home state of Nebraska, a reliable and
deep relationship with natural resources by family farmers has been nearly lost
and large corporate agricultural enterprises have all but taken over; the
family farm and the families themselves are now threatened by increasingly
unsustainable methods that put profit above purpose. The overproduction of
commercial crops has grown to become a major cause of a climate in crisis and
driven the mass popularization of dietary dysfunction, while shareholder
interests have made it increasingly impossible for even the most dedicated to
make a living off the land. The ancient purpose of the role of the farmer as
provider of nourishment and the arbiter of access to the wisdom of nature, has
been eclipsed by market expansion and the modern practices of mega-farming.
When I talk to the farm operations managers in my community, they describe the
goal of innovation in environmental sustainability in terms of increasing yield
while driving greater efficiency to achieve higher profits. Yet, I firmly
believe we live in a unique historical moment where the next level of our
common welfare depends on successfully reclaiming the core integrity of age-old
agriculture, while incorporating the ancient principles of plant intelligence
and natural wisdom. Family farms are as much at risk of extinction as the local
shaman in Peru, the tribal doctor in Gabon, or far too many other species that
have a right to thrive on Earth; our job, indeed my mission at PGS, should be
to enable and empower the next generation of entrepreneurs with breakthrough
innovations that sustains us all. While many students may define success of
their MBA studies as developing a great new app, I believe the world does not
need the next new Uber. I believe that we can dedicate our research and develop
the next “uber successful” solution to the problematic misguided practices that
are driving the world to irreversible destruction.
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