ELIANT Conference 2016
Freedom of Choice Under Threat:
What Can European Citizens Do?

ELIANT’s contribution to safeguarding European values and availability of choice

With 197 registrations and more than 140 participants, lively workshops and inspiring presentations the conference of November 7th was a great success. For a first impression please find here some pictures and the twitter story of the conference as well as ELIANT’S main concerns and requests.

Agenda

Opening
Sophie Beernaerts, Head of Schools and Education Unit in DC EAG      Summary 
Michaela Glöckler, President of ELIANT      Summary 

Workshops
Agriculture: Land Sharing and Plant Breeding      Summary 01, Summary 02 and PowerPoint
Democracy and the Responsibility of Civil Society      Summary
Integrative Medicine. A Way forward for Public Health      Summary and PowerPoint 01, PowerPoint 02
Public Health: Prototypes for Patient-Centered Healthcare in Europe      Summary and PowerPoint
Education: The Digital Dilemma – To Use or to Be Used      Summary and PowerPoint
People with Special Needs: Necessary Care and Support      Summary and PowerPoint
Citizens' Fundamental Rights: The EU Charter and its Neglected Aspects      Summary and PowerPoint

Closing
Closing Speech by Gerald Häfner: The task of civil society in "Brexit-Europe"      Summary 

Suggestion:

CNN report "Silicon Valley school with no computers"

http://edition.cnn.com/videos/tech/2012/03/13/dnt-simon-no-tech-schools.cnn

European Alliance of Initiatives for Applied Anthroposophy

ELIANT’s main concerns and requests with regard to EU legislation and policies are on the fields of

Agriculture and nutrition

• No artificial vitamin fortification for biodynamic and other organic baby food
• Assure the continued legal making and use of biodynamic preparations
• Legal protection of biodynamic agriculture and organic farming against Genetically Modified Organism/  GMO contamination
• Hygiene legislation in the food chain must not lead to the abolition of Small and Medium-sized Enterprise/ SME s in rural areas; introduction of the concept of salutogenesis in hygiene measures
• Secure voluntary (not mandatory) electronic identification (EID) in animal keeping and production

Medicine and Health

• develop adequate legislative and regulatory frameworks to secure access to all Anthroposophic Medicinal Products for human use (AMP) equally for citizens in all European Member states
• implement fully the right of establishment and the free movement of services for Anthroposophic Medicine (AM) professionals,
• integrate the appropriate patients’ rights into measures relating to consumers’ interests,  especially in view of patients using AM,
• appropriately integrate the AM into measures related to the improvement of public health

Education and lifelong learning

• improve educational outcomes by reassessing how certain childhood competences such as the development of imagination in free play are prerequisite to the development of creativity and social competences later on in life,
• engage the motivation, thinking skills and creative action of young people through, for instance, the increased use of portfolio work and greater freedom of curricula,
• build the educational system on health promotion, loving interest instead on fear to fail – strengthen the general human in every person in order to encourage desire and sense for tolerance and peace,
• involve more actively independent educational stakeholders in the clusters devoted to educational themes

Disabilities

• pay special attention to the situation of people with special needs, such as learning disabilities and complex dependency needs, within the European Disability Strategy 2010 – 2020

Research

• Future R&D Programmes of the EU, in particular FP 8 should more substantially take into account the need for holistic research approaches to living processes.
• Establish a technology platform “Complementary and holistic research in life sciences”.

For more information:
https://eliant.eu/fileadmin/user_upload/memorandum-alliance-eliant.pdf

November 2016

About ELIANT

ELIANT is an alliance of 10 European associations concerned with agriculture, nutrition, medicine and health, patients' rights, education, care for people with special needs, democracy and ethical economics. Founded in Brussels in 2006, it gives a voice to many innovative initiatives of applied anthroposophy in Europe.