7-11 June 2019; 

We won't have a society if we destroy the environment. Margaret Mead

Many individuals are doing what they can. But real success can only come if there is a change in our societies and in our economics and in our politics. David Attenborough

Food is the basis of community and civilisation. Many of the world’s current problems can be ascribed to food systems and agricultural policy.

The general public, politicians, and even businesses are becoming more conscious of the damage done to the planet and its myriad causes: exploitation of non-renewable resources, industrial farming, climate change, pollution, and the population itself. Nature is evidently intrinsic to modern human life. For some, the countdown to doomsday has already started. Now, the new ‘frontline’ is all around us – it is our environment.

Internationally renowned journalism pioneer, the Frontline Club, and food and culture hub, Castello di Potentino, are teaming up to highlight these issues and address them through a series of talks: live streaming from medieval castle and farm estate in remote Tuscany to London transmitting the rural directly into a variety of urban situations, while keeping an increasingly isolationist UK in touch with discussion in the EU. The first symposium will take place 7-11 June 2019.

The collaboration weds Potentino’s food and wine mission to Frontline’s journalistic expertise with the aim of creating a dynamic, constructive debate around what we eat, agriculture, the natural world, and how we receive information about it through the media.  

Guests at the first Frontline-Potentino Symposium will include: the Economist’s John Hooper, Human Rights lawyer Terry Collingsworth, Founder of Rococo Chocolate Chantal Coady OBE, award-winning documentary director Miki Mistrati, and social innovators Nelson and Maggie Reiyia.

Charlotte Horton, Director of Castello di Potentino explains: ‘Ancient communities established themselves through food systems. By developing an understanding of their environment they provided not only sustenance for survival, but also the evolution of more complex cultural activities and improved methods of cultivation. Civilization developed from a productive relationship with the land. But now, in times of ultra-urbanization, many societies have become disconnected from the natural environment, leaving a small percentage of the population in control of overall nutrition.

This fragmentation between the rural and the urban is marked by a trend towards large scale, heavily industrialized agriculture. Produce is shipped enormous distances for ever-growing populations, which makes individual groups vulnerable and has a significant impact on the environment. When we lose control of our own resources, society is powerless to provide for local communities. If what we eat is a reflection of our community, then what does food that has travel thousands of miles say about who we are?’

Frontline Club

The Frontline Club is a media club near London's Paddington Station. With a strong emphasis on conflict reporting, it aims to champion independent journalism, provide an effective platform from which to support diversity and professionalism in the media, promote safe practice, and encourage both freedom of the press and freedom of expression worldwide.

Discussion Themes

Themes to be discussed include:

• Crime and Fraud in Food
• Humanitarian Aid, Immigration and Global Food Policies
• Veganism
• Extinction Rebellion
• Food Policies

The Programme

Streamed events are shown in red, all times are in Central European Time

Friday 7 June
 
5pm
Wine Tasting and Introduction to Potentino
 
6pm
Across the Big Blue Sea
Good Intentions and Hard Lessons in an Italian Refugee Home.
Author Katja Meier in conversation with Karen Robinson, Editor at The Sunday Times

Join us live:
via Google Hangouts (you will be able to participate)
https://hangouts.google.com/hangouts/_/esujgfdgvvdtzjlyczpkzpu6eae
via YouTube (viewing only)
http://youtu.be/enfn0tAp_WI
 
7pm
A Recent History of Migrants in Italy
Discussion with Wolfgang Achtner, Journalist, documentary filmmaker, photographer, and professor

Saturday 8 June
 
10am
Can humanitarian assistance help mend broken food systems? 
Discussion with Frances Kennedy, Communications Officer WFP, on the role of the UN World Food Programme in the face of growing hunger crises.
 
11am
Slave and Child Labour
Discussion with Terry Collingsworth, Labour and human rights attorney, whose article on Child Slavery in the Chocolate industry has just been published in the Washington Post.

12am
The AgroMafia
Discussion with Michele Fino, Associate Professor of European Legal Roots, University of Gastronomic Sciences

Lunch
 
2pm
Documentary screening: The Dark Side of Chocolate 
Presentation with Miki Mistrati, award-winning documentarian

3pm
On Institutional initiatives dealing with migration
Discussion with Ben Mason and Francesca Lionetti 
Ben Mason, Researcher and project leader at Better Place, leading work on digital innovation around refugees and migration 
Francesca Lionetti, Project Manager, Intercultural Cities, Council of Europe
 
5pm
Salmon Nation and Ecotrust
A discussion with Ian Gill, Writer, filmmaker, and social entrepreneur
(Live Streaming from Canada)

Join us live:
via Google Hangouts (you will be able to participate)
https://hangouts.google.com/hangouts/_/zvx3wjpvuzc5ljqivwscb5dv6ie
via YouTube (viewing only)
http://youtu.be/DxWt-UanOPI
 
 
6pm
Iran to Italy
Discussion with Kamin Mohammadi, Writer, journalist and broadcaster specialising in Iran
Author of Narrative fare: how food tells the stories of our lives, culture and identity

 
7pm
The Great Debate: What are we really eating?
A discussion of global food policies and how they affect us chaired by John Hooper, Italy Correspondent of The Economist
Also streamed to the Frontline Club

Join us live:
via Google Hangouts (you will be able to participate)
https://hangouts.google.com/hangouts/_/kdpruy77dbasrcgb2tuuarntame
via YouTube (viewing only)
http://youtu.be/SnB2Gxe3NHc

Sunday 9 June
 
10am
Documentary screening: Shady Chocolate
Presentation with Miki Mistrati, award-winning documentarian
 
11am
The Politics of Water
A discussion with Zach White, Consultant - Water Portfolio at Oxford Policy Management

 
12am
Hunger, the Food System and Climate Change – Insights from Pakistan and India
Discussion with Harry Johnstone, Writer, researcher Libya
 
Lunch
 
2pm
Sustainable innovation
Discussion with Nelson and Margaret Reiyia, Social innovators and conservationists 

Join us live:
via Google Hangouts (you will be able to participate)
https://hangouts.google.com/hangouts/_/aanml7gef5fhrggysbct5iuf5ae
via YouTube (viewing only)
http://youtu.be/CuNleWuWz4s
 
3pm
Sustainable Social Innovation on a Large-Scale
Discussion with Ric Young, Social innovator, founder of The Social Project Studio
BOLDNESS Project

 
4pm
Curing the Limbo – making refugees into equal citizens
Discussion with Amalia Zepou, Athens vice mayor for civil society and innovation

 
5pm
The New Organic Alto Adige, Mals project
Live Streamed Discussion with Philip Ackerman-Leist Dean, School of the New American Farmstead
 

Join us live:
via Google Hangouts (you will be able to participate)
https://hangouts.google.com/hangouts/_/zgggqqwxijdezowv2k3uuoxrdue
via YouTube (viewing only)
http://youtu.be/1QTTa3mYgsk

 
6pm
The Dark Side of Cheese
Cheese making demonstration and discussion with Lorenzo Messana & Francesca Ruffaldi, of Caseifico Murceti, Cheese and milk product producers

 
7pm
Contemporary Restaurant Culture
Discussion with Luca Farinotti 
(streaming from Parma)
Author and restaurant manager 


Join us live:
via Google Hangouts (you will be able to participate)
https://hangouts.google.com/hangouts/_/7ilmitkfmfagpodywoi5vdx3die
via YouTube (viewing only)
http://youtu.be/sPzQAK9_99c