The Soap Box section is me touting for speaking engagements.
Why?
All I want to do is change the world - simple really. I want people to reconnect with their food and realise that food is fundamental to our existence and the elephant in the room from a sociological and environmental perspective.
I encourage and value the questions at the end of a talk because this is where a speaker's knowledge of the subject matter is best tested - this also helps put my ego back in its box. Question time is often where the anecdotal stories are expanded and convey the most real life/world information.
And I enjoy it!
What on earth can a farmer have to talk about?
Not just the weather I assure you.
Some topics I have addressed:
- The food crisis, what crisis??
- What to eat? aka an omnivore's dilemma.
- The ethics of eating meat.
- Biodiversity on farms - defining 'natural' environment.
- Food and energy/health/resilience/restorative systems
- Slow Food and Fast Science
- Food for Thought - the ramblings of a pseudo intellectual agrarian socialist farmer.
Or if you have a specific topic or area of food and agriculture and how this impacts society and the environment, I will happily address that providing your group with a challenge or two.
I am told I am an entertaining and thought provoking speaker - see comments below. I also am a analytical and lateral thinker capable of synthesising and distilling complex subjects to their essence.
Michael's Soap Box - terms, conditions and prices (if applicable).
If you would like me to speak at your next gathering I will happily do so on the following conditions:
1. Obviously the timing of any talks or speaking engagements will need to be mutually convenient.
2. I am a strong supporter of community groups, so if you represent a not for profit organisation without paid employees and rely entirely on voluntary efforts, I will speak for free. If you are some distance from the farm I may ask for my travel and accommodation costs to be met. That said, together we will make every endeavour to keep my/your costs as low as possible.
3. If you are a not for profit organisation that has any paid employees or sub-contractors, then I will charge a small speakers fee in addition to any modest travel and accommodation costs.
4. If you are a for-profit organisation of any description the speakers fee, travel and accommodation will by negotiation.
5. If you require a formal contract for the speaking engagement, there will be a $500 surcharge. If you need an explanation as to why this is so, perhaps I am the wrong speaker for you.
Please note that I have been engaged and paid by Federal and State government bodies without a formal contract - so if government can do it without red tape, it IS possible for your group too.
Some previous speaking engagements to illustrate diversity.
Numerous Radio interviews with ABC Radio National and Local ABC stations.
Featured on the televisions ABC 7:30 Report
Numerous press interviews and a few published opinion pieces.
Food matters workshops - Canberra
Canberra Organic Growers
Terra Madre - Turin Italy
Corin Bank Festival - Canberra
Sydney International Food Festival
Floriade - Canberra
and many small gatherings of community groups such as Lions, Probus, Rotary clubs.
What people say.
From the Honey and Soy website http://www.honeyandsoy.com/food-speaker-series-at-the-australian-science-festival/
"If I was inspired after Janet’s talk, I was positively fired up after talking to Michael Croft from Mountain Creek Farm. I’m not sure when Soy and I became interested in growing our own food. We didn’t grow up experiencing the land, keeping chooks or collecting eggs. Until very recently, we didn’t even think about it! Food just kind of miraculously appeared. Michael put it very brilliantly, I think, when he said that we need to know the What, When, Why, Where and How when it comes to our food, and very few people actually stop to think and question. My chat with Michael is positively mind blowing. What started out as a hobby and a natural gravitation to fresh produce and real food for Soy and I actually has huge implications, and implications that reach far, far beyond us. Food, and how we grow, produce, distribute, and consume it, has implications on humanity as a whole. I felt like Michael had lifted a blindfold from my eyes. Michael’s farm is located on the foothills of the Brindabella Mountains and produces a range of products including Belted Galloway beef and Wessex Saddleback pork. When I asked Michael what he hoped to do through his farm, he said “Well, I want to change the world.” And I admire him enormously for how unabashedly he says so. For I too, want to change the world, and Soy and I will be on that path, no matter how small our steps are."