VISION
A global ecosystem of healthy, thriving communities in which regenerative land management cools the planet, feeds the world, and promotes public health, prosperity, and peace.
Photo by Gaetano Cessati on Unsplash
Mission
Regeneration Canada is a nonprofit organization that promotes land management practices that regenerate soil health, in order to mitigate climate change, restore biodiversity, improve water cycles, and support a more productive and just food system.
We strive towards this goal by empowering farmers, landowners, scientists, agronomists, businesses, community organizations, governments, and consumers to play a role in soil regeneration.
Photo by Kyle Ellefson on Unsplash
History
Regeneration Canada started as a grassroots initiative. A handful of Montrealers with a mutual passion for living soils met up in the fall of 2016 and were inspired to organize an event on this topic in their hometown. While the regenerative movement was already thriving in the United States, it seemed crucial to start spreading the word in Canada. Montreal seemed like the perfect place for such an initiative, at the junction between the U.S., Canada and francophone countries. The Living Soils Symposium Montreal was born.
In light of the incredible level of interest and engagement around the Symposium, Gabrielle Bastien founded Regeneration Canada in May 2017 to pioneer the regenerative movement in Canada beyond the event.
Photo by Nadia Hunt
Team
Meet the core team of people who contribute to the strategy and management behind Regeneration Canada.
Gabrielle Bastien
Founder and Executive Director
Gabrielle’s life mission is to promote regenerative land management as a way to mitigate climate change and foster healthy food systems. This passion arose while obtaining her Master’s degree in Sustainability and Environmental Management at Harvard University, completed in 2016, where she realized that soil regeneration presents the greatest opportunity to simultaneously alleviate the food, climate, water and biodiversity crises.
Interested in diving in deeper in the practical aspects of permaculture, Gabrielle did an apprenticeship on Ben Falk’s Whole Systems Design farm in Vermont in 2015 and focused her Master’s thesis on the economic viability of permaculture-inspired farms in Quebec.
Prior to her graduate studies, she obtained a Bachelor of Business Administration in Marketing at HEC Montréal and gathered years of work experience in communications, project management and event planning.
Gabrielle led the team that launched the Living Soils Symposium Montreal in 2017 and founded Regeneration Canada.
Antonious Petro
Projects Manager
Antonious Petro is a biologist and a certified permaculture designer whose vision of an ideal society would be a symbiotic collaboration of permaculture principles, circular economy and social justice. He has a Bachelor’s degree in Biology From Minia University, Egypt and a graduate degree in Community Economic Development from Concordia University. He is passionate about soil regeneration, social innovation and bike mechanics. Since his arrival in Montreal in 2013, he has gathered a vast experience in project coordination in sustainability, food security, business development and ecological land management. At Regeneration Canada, Antonious coordinates the soil education program and is the administrative assistant.
Laurence Côté-Leduc
Project Manager
Laurence is a community organizer with extensive experience in the nonprofit sector.
She holds a M. Sc. in public health from Université Laval, a B.A. in international studies and sustainable development from HEC Montréal, has done a semester abroad at University of Western Australia, is leading and implementing community events and green alleys to promote healthy lifestyles, and studies permaculture design and regenerative agriculture.
Her passion for community building has led her to projects in Québec (Canada), Costa Rica, West Africa and Haiti.
Isabelle Lemaire
Program & Logistics Coordinator
Isabelle is passionate about complex systems, regenerative practices, sustainable business, architecture, the environment and living in a world that promotes peace and diversity. She has traveled widely, from the Sahel to the glaciers of Patagonia passing through the silk road and is now calling Montreal home. Having worked in contexts ranging from a research institute, to a university, small NGOs, a multi-national paper company, a small consulting outfit and many African farmer’s fields, Isabelle has a proven track record on being highly adaptable and open to new perspectives. Isabelle also holds a bachelors in communication and cinema, a first masters in environment and development and second one in human systems.
Sarah Barsalou
Network Coordinator
Sarah is a trained lawyer and holds Bachelor degrees in both International Studies and in Law. For several years, she practiced as a lawyer representing victims of workplace harassment. When she realized the urgency of the state of our planet, she knew she had to work towards finding solutions to combat climate change. Sarah is passionate about cooking and sustainable food systems. She loves learning about regenerative agricultural practices that are healthier for our food and our planet. She has done many workshops on foraging, has volunteered on farms, and loves to go camping and to cook in the outdoors. At Regeneration Canada, Sarah is in charge of managing the community of members, creating partnerships and expanding our network of leaders in the soil regeneration sector.
Board of directors
Our board of directors is comprised of passionate soil enthusiasts from various sectors who bring a diversity of perspectives to the organization.
Ananda Fitzsimmons
President Co-Founder, Inocucor
Ananda Lynn Fitzsimmons is an out-of-the-box thinker, visionary and environmentalist, with a passion for soil and growing food. She has had lifelong interest in sustainable food production and land management as well as social change and personal empowerment. She spent many years experimenting with microbial potions based on naturally occurring microbes extracted from plants, composts and soil. In 2008, she teamed up with Dr. Margaret Bywater Ekegard and they founded Inocucor Technologies. The company, now called Concentric, commercializes products for agriculture based on consortia of naturally occurring beneficial microorganisms. She now works as a consultant promoting soil health and regenerative land management practices.
Vincent Fluet
Vice-President Agronomist and Advisor for Businesses, SADC d’Abitibi-Ouest
Vincent has always wanted to contribute to building a better world. Motivated by this goal, he completed a bachelor’s degree in 2012 in Conflict Studies jointly offered by St. Paul University and the University of Ottawa. For his academic results, he was awarded with the Governor General’s Silver Medal. After studying the many conflicts on our planet (environmental, food, religious, ethnic, economic, etc.), he felt that he should deepen his knowledge of one of them to make a more concrete contribution. Upon mature reflection, the issue of hunger appeared as the most important and most fundamental challenge. With this in mind, Vincent continued his studies and graduated in 2015 with a bachelor’s degree in Agroeconomy from Université Laval. The same year, he became part of the Ordre des agronomes du Québec. Feeling the call of his native region, he returned to settle in Abitibi-Témiscamingue where he now works as a business advisor at the Société d’aide au développement des collectivités (SADC) d’Abitibi-Ouest where he coordinates a local food marketing project.
Cameron Stiff
Treasurer Director of Finance and Development, Compost Montreal
Cameron Stiff has worked on sustainability issues from a variety of angles and scales over the past 15 years, from the United Nations to his local community centre. He is currently Director of Finance and Development for Compost Montreal and is president of the Hudson Food Collective and secretary for Urban Agriculture Laboratory. He has a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology from Concordia University, where he is currently undertaking a Masters of Science in Geography, Planning and Environment, studying the political economy of organic waste in Quebec and the potential for redesigning organic waste management systems to support urban agriculture projects. In 2011, he was recognized as a Sustainability Champion by Concordia University.
Agathe Moreau
Secretary Urban Agriculture Coordinator, Sentier urbain
Agathe Moreau is passionate about urban agriculture, food systems resilience and community development. After having completed studies in environment and geography, she undertook studies in geomatics at the University of Montreal. Following a brief passage into the world of risk and disaster management abroad, she is migrating to the community sector. For the last five years, she has had the chance of working for different nonprofits and is currently the Urban Agriculture Coordinator for Sentier Urbain. She is also the Co-Founder of an urban beekeeping collective with the mission of raising awareness about the importance of pollinators.
Geneviève Boyer
Administrator Producer, TAXI
Guillaume Rivest
Administrator Independant Environment & Outdoor Journalist
Guillaume Rivest grew up in Abitibi-Témiscamingue on a small family farm. He rapidly developed an attachment to the land and to local agriculture. Guillaume holds a bachelor’s degree in Applied Politics from the University of Sherbrooke and is currently completing the thesis for his master’s degree in Environmental Management with a concentration in political science. During his graduate studies, he has had the chance of being an accredited observer during the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris. He was able to follow closely the climatic negotiations and question stakeholders in the environmental field on the challenges and solutions to adopt. Guillaume is currently an independent journalist specialized in outdoors and environmental topics. He has worked as a journalist for Radio-Canada in Abitibi-Témiscamingue for just over a year before reorienting his career. His knowledge in public policy, communication, environment and the carbon market will without a doubt be useful for Regeneration Canada.
Michael Warren
Administrator CEO, Earth Alive Clean Technologies
Michael Warren (B.A. Marketing, Bishop’s U) has founded and grown a number of environmentally focused businesses over the past 20 years. With his natural propensity for adventure and discovery, he has made it a priority to identify innovative earth- and human-friendly business concepts and bring them to world markets. Michael’s interest in organic food has led him to build and manage LFP Solutions, an organic soil inputs distribution company with a focus on living soils. In 2014, LFP joined Earth Alive before going public, and Michael developed the Agriculture division. In May 2017 Michael was appointed CEO of Earth Alive. He regularly speaks on topics of sustainable business development, particularly agriculture, and still finds time to grow organic food on his family farm.
Advisors
We are blessed to benefit from the insights of a number of advisors with various expertises, including scientists, farmers, agronomists, business people and more.