Dear all,

Thanks for your response on my previous short email, announcing a new upcoming SALSA Email-based conference (e-conference), facilitated by FAO. And I am really encouraged that out of the 462 participants of the first SALSA e-conference, only 2 opted to no longer participate.

As the first SALSA e-conference was organized over a year ago, a short refresher:
This first e-conference was to support and give input to the SALSA project (SALSA: "“Small Farms, Small Food Businesses and Sustainable Food Security”, see more here). The SALSA project had just started at the time of the first e-conference, and your input helped outlining and steering SALSA, as a project.
A short run-down of the first e-conference, you find here. You can also check the e-conference summary document.

Now, 16 months later, the SALSA project has gained significant momentum and has done quite some work already. Time has now come to verify some of our current findings and future assumptions, and to check for practical examples and tangible feedback from you all, as most of you are field-based, or have strong links/experience with field-based projects.

Our next e-conference is scheduled to run from March 19 until April 19. We are now working on the background document and outlining the questions which will frame the help/feedback we need from you. Having been involved in this preparation for the past weeks, I am truly encouraged about the attention and importance the SALSA team gives to this e-conference… — Which in a way puts the pressure on us (you, our e-conference participants, and us, the moderators): we *will* look for tangible input, feedback and examples.

Topics which we are (still in draft) thinking about are:
- Cooperation between small farmers
- Contributions of small farmers to the resilience of the food system
- Past strategies and policies for small farmers to overcome their main challenges
- Strategies and policies which would allow small farmers to address challenges in the future
- The way food supply chain businesses might contribute to small farmers
- How policies can affect small farms’ activities and decision making
...

We will announce our next e-conference in the next weeks, but if already now, I ask of you: if you know of colleagues who would like to participate, do encourage them to do so. Ask them to register to our e-conference by sending a short email to “[log in to unmask]”, specifying:
- Their email address to be registered on the list
- Their full name
- Organisation, institute, company they work with, and their function (or simply note “private” if they want to participate on their own behalf).
.. and I will add them to our e-conference mailing list.

I will keep you informed when the official e-conference announcement goes out, and when we start the actual e-conference.

I am truly excited to hear your feedback and will do my best to ensure your input is well reflected within the e-conference.

best,
Peter
SALSA e-conference moderator.


From: Peter Casier <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Wednesday, 31 January 2018 at 12:48
To: "[log in to unmask]" <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Heads-up: new SALSA e-conference coming up

Dear all,

We truly appreciate your contribution to the SALSA e-conference back in October 2016. 

We are now preparing for a new Email-based conference/consultation, starting in a few weeks. If any of you would NOT want to participate in this new round, please send me an email via [log in to unmask] and I will unsubscribe you from this list.

best,

Peter
SALSA e-conference facilitator



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