This is Phidel with greetings from Kenya and one of the participants of the C4C training workshop. I woke up today looking forward to day 9. Being a warm day, the morning weather was on my side unlike the other cold days with the birds making sweet music to my ears. The day started with a powerful quote “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. It is the only thing that ever has.” Margaret Mead. It was followed by a story of the Star Fish and the Spider that brought out the different Organizations/Movement models referencing to the book, “The Star Fish and the Spider” written by Ori Brafman & Rod E.Brackstrom. This introduced the Organic Guarantee Systems that talked about the Organic Certifications, Standards and regulations within different countries and with a global outlook. The afternoon session was all about Public Guarantee Systems (PGS) that is a quality assurance for local production and the day was wrapped with an interesting plenary session the “Fish Bowl” where all participants sat in a circle with three sitting at the center of the circle together with the moderator to lead the discussions. If a member of the outer circle had a contribution, he/she would stand up and tap the shoulder of one of the person’s in the inner circle to replace him/her. This session ended the day at a very high note having gone through very technical sessions the whole day.

Photos (clockwise): Konrad Hauptfleisch presenting the Spider and Star Fish concept; participants mapping organic networks in Kenya; participants presenting their analysis; lively fish bowl discussion on seed diversity.