The North American Prairie Conference is a national meeting which has been held every other year since 1968 to bring together a diverse community of scholars interested in restoring and preserving the prairie ecosystem. A rapid expansion of large-scale agriculture contributed to the extirpation of prairies from the landscape with enormous consequences on ecological stability, loss of soil and biodiversity and the demise of a human culture linked to land management and preservation. In the last forty years increasing efforts have been carried out by a small group of leaders in the Midwest region of the US to restore land in accord with Aldo Leopold's philosophy. The North American Prairie Conference (NAPC) grew out of this effort. In 2008 (August 4-8), the conference will be hosted by Winona State University in Winona, Minnesota.
The intellectual merits of the North American Prairie Conference are diverse and inextricably intertwined with scientific knowledge of complex systems (prairies) and society's decision-making and culture in managing natural resources. This effort aims also at achieving sustainability in agriculture with implications to improve curriculum and pedagogy in agricultural education and in the life/environmental sciences. The PI's participation in previous NAPCs and his record of publications in conference proceedings substantiates a commitment to prairie restoration efforts and verifies his passion for multidisciplinary research and education in sustainability. Also, an emerging research focus in Minnesota is biomass production from prairies as a source of renewable energy. This emphasis of the conference contributes to the redesign of future farms providing sustainable opportunities to remain economically viable. The NAPC emphasizes a multidisciplinary approach to research and education aimed at finding long term solutions to current land and resource management practices. The conference theme "The Prairie Meets the River" offers opportunities to a diverse community of prairie practitioners, educators and scholars to participate and share knowledge. A variety of concurrent sessions is attractive to a diversity of stakeholders and students from all prairie states (Southern Canada to the Gulf of Mexico region) to present their work in an environment easily accessible to everyone.
