Sustaining Rural Communities Conference 2013

The Crossing Theatre, Narrabri, June 5 & 6

You are encouraged to book for the fourth annual Sustaining Rural Communities Conference before 5pm on Monday 27th May, 2013.

Whilst the theme for this years conference is resilience, our topics will look at:

• what does a resilient community look like?
• why do we need to be resilient?
• how do we measure resilience in a community?
• what kinds of influences are impacting on communities?
• what has worked in other communities?

A thought provoking and high quality program has now been finalised and includes national and international speakers such as:

• Professor Ian Lowe – Australia’s most respected environmental scientists and President of the Australian Conservation Foundation.
• Lance Gunderson – a leading international thinker in community resilience and presently an Associate Professor at Emory Uni, Atlanta
• Dr John Edwards – has an international economic development background and presently holds a number of highly respected roles including a member of the Reserve Bank of Australia board.
• Helena Norberg- Hodge – is a analyst of the impact of the global economy on cultures and agriculture worldwide

An important focus of the conference is that of empowering attendees to make changes in their own communities.  The Conference will equip you with the skills, networks and resources you need to be able to reach your goals.  Some of the skills you will acquire include:

• introducing yourself effectively
• stimulating the best from yourself and those around you and the community in general
• understanding the four determinants of human behavior and how these drive your actions and reactions
• identifying the opportunities and strengths in your community
• engaging young people in your community
• identifying, maintaining and enhancing your community’s identity
• managing change in your community
• bouncing back from natural disasters
• analyzing your community’s economics

The conference has a legacy of helping people do amazing things and as part of this we will hear from the five winners of the conference bursary in 2012 and we will experience over 40 posters of success stories from rural and regional communities across the nation.

It will be undoubtedly the best conference so far, so make your booking before 5pm Monday 27th May.