The RegenNarration

“If, like us, you’re currently steeped in long days of homebound self-isolation, take a look around your dwelling and observe a moment of gratitude. The more topsy-turvy the world outside becomes, the more we can see the importance of a stable place to live, and that housing and health are often the same thing.” - Reasons to be Cheerful article ‘Why Hospitals are Building Housing’.Around the world, co-ops are playing a significant role in providing housing solutions, and in the process building empowered, sustainable and healthy communities. Up to 40% of housing in some cities around the world is in coops. Whether you’re talking financial, social, environmental, cultural or health outcomes, the benefits across the whole of society can be enormous. So what are housing cooperatives? What are the main benefits and challenges? Why are they so successful in some parts of the world? And what’s needed to do more of them elsewhere? To talk about all this, I hosted a panel brought together from around Australia by Eugenie Stockmann. Eugenie is an award-winning developer, sustainability consultant, affiliate of an international network of cohousing professionals, and now CEO of Co-operation Housing. Joining her on the panel are:Dr Jasmine Palmer: researcher of collaborative housing and sustainable design, and a member of Urban Coup CohousingAnthony Taylor: Policy Offer at the Business Council of Co-operatives and Mutuals - the peak body and voice for Co-ops and Mutuals in AustraliaMichelle Mackenzie: CEO of Shelter WA - an independent peak body that advocates for social and affordable housing and ending homelessnessPeter Shooter: Resident First Fremantle Housing Collective and Chair of Co-operation HousingWith an impromptu appearance from Danielle Pender, Manager of the Community Housing Strategy at the State Department of Communities.It’s telling that here in Western Australia alone there are 9,000 homeless people and more than 14,000 on the social housing wait list. At the same time, so much of our housing is under-utilised and misdirected. For example, 82% of housing consists of 3 to 5 bedrooms, but 58% of WA homes house just 1 or 2 people. So how much housing do we need? How do we direct that need most effectively? And where will the investment for this come from? The event also launched a series of 5 short videos on housing co-operatives. (Prominent WA producer of these videos, and Co-operation Housing board member, Sohan Ariel Hayes credits being a coop housing resident with enabling his successful artistic life.)This episode is produced with thanks to Co-operation Housing. The event took place at the UniversSend us a textSupport the showThe RegenNarration is independent, ad-free and freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber to help keep the show on the road - and gain access to a great community and some exclusive benefits - on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find my writing). You can also donate directly via the website (avoiding fees) or PayPal. I hope to see you at an event, and even The RegenNarration shop. And thanks for sharing with friends!

Alanna Shaikh is a global health systems expert. She delivered a TEDx talk barely 2 weeks ago which has been viewed almost seven million times already across its TED & YouTube sites. On the latter it is titled ‘Coronavirus is our future’. But as much as outlining why that is so, a legacy of the human-induced planetary degradation that has brought COVID-19 upon us, it’s about how we can create a different future. How can we learn from the wake-up call of this outbreak, to create a more responsive and universal global health system? A system where, as Alanna puts it, equity is our social immune system. Bill Gates has written that such a health system will cost billions, and that’d be a bargain. The same can be said for the broader systems restoration project, where ecosystem restoration is key, and related systems of food, agriculture, economics, education and media all play vital roles.The coronavirus, and the future ones we’re currently headed for, are notably symptomatic of the same patterns underlying biodiversity loss, economic volatility and climate disruption. “Coronavirus is our climate crisis at high speed”, Alanna says. So we’ve got a moment here, while doing our belated but inspired best to withstand our current crisis, where we can get at the roots of it all, and re-orient our societies towards a new and better normal.Title slide: from TEDxSMU, by Kim Leeson.With thanks to our friends at the Wellbeing Economy Alliance for bringing Alanna's TEDx talk to our attention. Due to licencing restrictions, our guest’s nominated music can only be played on radio or similarly licenced broadcasts of this episode. Find more:Alanna’s blog.Alanna’s consultancy.Coronavirus is our Future TEDx talk.Send us a textSupport the showThe RegenNarration is independent, ad-free and freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber to help keep the show on the road - and gain access to a great community and some exclusive benefits - on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find my writing). You can also donate directly via the website (avoiding fees) or PayPal. I hope to see you at an event, and even The RegenNarration shop. And thanks for sharing with friends!

Jo Chandler is an award-winning Australian journalist, author, editor, and educator. She’s become perhaps Australia’s best and most recognised climate journalist, also authoring the awarded book on the topic, Feeling the Heat. Her most recent Walkley Award, Australia’s highest honour in journalism, was for her ongoing freelance work. Jo’s grappled with media and climate disruption on the front line, and shares powerful thoughts on the stories that need to be told, and how we can continue to tell them. Gutsy, moving and instructive, this is an insider’s view of a rapidly shifting media context, the great adventure story of climate science, and long-form freelance journalism as a means of reconnecting us with real news, and the people who make it. Is this art of story-telling still an effective way to contextualise, personalise and build trust – in science, the living world, and even each other? And if so, how do we best keep doing it?Anthony met Jo for this conversation at the State Theatre Centre in Perth late last year, during the Quantum Words Festival.Title slide: Jo Chandler, sourced from her website.With thanks to Quantum Words Festival, WritingWA, and the WA State Theatre Centre.Music:The System, by the Public Opinion Afro Orchestra.Concluding music by Jeremiah Johnson.Due to licencing restrictions, our guest’s nominated music can only be played on radio or similarly licenced broadcasts of this episode. Find more:Jo’s website.Quantum Words Festival Perth.Send us a textSupport the showThe RegenNarration is independent, ad-free and freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber to help keep the show on the road - and gain access to a great community and some exclusive benefits - on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find my writing). You can also donate directly via the website (avoiding fees) or PayPal. I hope to see you at an event, and even The RegenNarration shop. And thanks for sharing with friends!

This special extra to episode 55 features Mike Salvaris continuing his Ministerial and cross-departmental presentation. We pick up with Mike as he moves from his authoritative global overview on the growing movement beyond GDP, to the nature and status of the proposal being made for a Western Australian Development Index. A reminder that a wonderful e-book of this presentation was also published last week, so while you don’t need to, if you would like to follow the visuals as you listen, you’ll find the link to a free download of the book below.Title slide: West Australian coastline (pic source).Find more:Listen to the main episode 55, Will this State Lead the Way Beyond GDP? A Ministerial presentation by Mike Salvaris. Australian National Development Index.The freely downloadable e-book of the presentation.Send us a textSupport the showThe RegenNarration is independent, ad-free and freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber to help keep the show on the road - and gain access to a great community and some exclusive benefits - on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find my writing). You can also donate directly via the website (avoiding fees) or PayPal. I hope to see you at an event, and even The RegenNarration shop. And thanks for sharing with friends!

Mike Salvaris is a global leader in the development of measures that go beyond the gross inadequacies of Gross Domestic Product, to give us a better picture of our society’s wellbeing or genuine progress. That is, how we’re tracking against what we actually value most – like quality of life, trustworthy institutions, and the health of our families, communities and the rest of the living world.Mike has advised governments, co-founded the OECD Global Progress Research Network, and is Director of the Australian National Development Index (ANDI). You might recall him from episode 48 last year, where he joined the live conversation in Perth with Dr Katherine Trebeck, the UK-based author central to the global Wellbeing Economy Alliance. Mike was in town at the time for high level talks about the prospect of a pilot running of ANDI in Western Australia. A few months later, he was invited back to make the comprehensive case to Ministers and cross-departmental staff, with ANDI Ambassador and former Australian of the Year, Professor Fiona Stanley. What was presented that day was in many ways the collation of a life’s work – culminating in this prospect. You’ll hear the main part of the presentation here – a concise yet comprehensive overview of what the OECD has affirmed to be a growing global movement beyond GDP, and how ANDI offers Australia an opportunity to join in. There’s also a special extra to this episode pertaining directly to the proposal being made for Western Australia, complete with next steps. A wonderful e-book of this presentation was also published last week, so while you don’t need to, if you would like to follow the visuals as you listen, you’ll find the link to a free download of the book below. Title slide: cartoon by Australian National Living Treasure, Michael Leunig, with which Mike opens his presentation. With thanks to the Minister David Templeman, Director General Duncan Ord and especially to Jodie Holbrook, Liz Toohey, Yvette Peterson and Carol Hodgen at the Department of Local Government, Sport and Cultural Industries. Thanks also to Gareth Andersen & Janith Lokuge for valued assistance with the recording.Music:The System, by the Public Opinion Afro Orchestra.Find more:Listen to the special extra to episode 55 on The Western Australian Development Index.Australian National Development Index. The freely downloadable e-book of the presentation.Send us a textSupport the showThe RegenNarration is independent, ad-free and freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber to help keep the show on the road - and gain access to a great community and some exclusive benefits - on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find my writing). You can also donate directly via the website (avoiding fees) or PayPal. I hope to see you at an event, and even The RegenNarration shop. And thanks for sharing with friends!

As elite sport resumes amidst the pandemic, the Royal Commission into Australia’s summer fires continues. So it seemed a good time to re-post this conversation with Dr Sheila Nguyen - to celebrate the return of top level sport, and to remember the rest of what sport can and needs to be in these times.This Black Summer in Australia saw a national T20 cricket match cancelled due to smoke, international tennis players choking on the pollution, and sports facilities burned down around the country. A few weeks ago, Australia’s Federal Opposition leader Anthony Albanese tweeted: “It’s Australian Open time. The eyes of the world are on us. The world is seeing air so toxic that players are collapsing and others are needing medical treatment. We can’t just sit by and accept this as the new normal. We need climate action – now.” Leaving aside the apparent contradictions in some of Mr Albanese’s other statements, this one well reflects our reality. And while fundraising by elite sport for communities most directly affected by the fires has been brilliant, and sport has been such an effective advocate in other areas of cultural life, the climate and extinction crises continue to threaten the places we love, and the things we love doing, including sport. So what role can sport play in reversing the trajectory of these crises, and furthering regenerative change?Dr Sheila Nguyen has been working at bringing together sports from around the country over the last decade or so to explore just that. Sheila is co-founder and Executive Director of the Sports Environment Alliance. Its members range from the biggest clubs in the land, to the smallest - from the reigning Australian Rules premiers the Richmond Tigers Football Club, to the Swamp Rats cricket club, along with local governments and others with responsibilities around sport. It goes by the hashtag #noplanetnoplay. Sheila was among the 2019 Australian Financial Review Top 100 Women of Influence, and is about to head to London next month to co-chair and MC the UN’s Sport for Climate Action’s Sport Positive event at Wembley Stadium. But as a lonely, overweight daughter of Vietnamese refugees, none of this seemed likely. Until sport changed her life.Updates: Malcolm Speed finished his term as Chair of the Alliance soon after this conversation in January 2020. And the March Wembley event was postponed due to the COVID-19 shut-down.Title slide: The Sydney Cricket Ground covered in bushfire smoke in the summer of 2019-20 (AAP).Music:The System, by the Public Opinion Afro OrchestraDue to licencing restrictions, our guest’s nominated music can only be played on radio or similarly licenced broadcasts of this episode. Find more:SpSend us a textSupport the showThe RegenNarration is independent, ad-free and freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber to help keep the show on the road - and gain access to a great community and some exclusive benefits - on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find my writing). You can also donate directly via the website (avoiding fees) or PayPal. I hope to see you at an event, and even The RegenNarration shop. And thanks for sharing with friends!

The summer here in Australia has been witnessed by people around the world, saddened and concerned as they’ve watched this country burn and be subsequently shrouded in heavy palls of smoke. This is a brief introduction to the new year of The RegenNarration, in reference and reverence to all that has happened, and what it means from here. Title slide: Firefighters struggle against the strong wind in an effort to secure nearby houses from bushfires near the town of Nowra in the Australian state of New South Wales, December 31, 2019 (pic: Saeed Khan/AFP/Getty - sourced from Insider.com).Music:By Jeremiah Johnson.Send us a textSupport the showThe RegenNarration is independent, ad-free and freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber to help keep the show on the road - and gain access to a great community and some exclusive benefits - on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find my writing). You can also donate directly via the website (avoiding fees) or PayPal. I hope to see you at an event, and even The RegenNarration shop. And thanks for sharing with friends!

We’re signing off for the year with an episode of highlights from our brilliant array of guests throughout 2019. With sincere thanks for tuning in, continuing to share and rate the podcast, and of course for donating and supporting its production. It couldn’t happen without you. Thanks also for getting in touch throughout the year to share stories, questions and insights, and to tell us how much you’ve valued the podcast. It’s been great to see our listener numbers spike further this year, and even more fulfilling to hear how the stories are landing and what the podcast means to you. Thank you very much!Track list:Podcast Theme, featuring Let Them Know, by the Public Opinion Afro Orchestra (& a range of guests from the podcast’s first year in 2017)Albert Wiggan (ep 34) Stephen Jenkinson (ep 35) Mother Canoe, by Stephen Jenkinson and Gregory Hoskins (Stephen’s choice)Michael Shuman (ep 36)Nora Bateson (ep 37)Damon Gameau (ep 38) on Velvet’s Unicorn, by Bryony Marks from the ‘2040’ original motion picture soundtrackDavid McLean (ep 39) Emma Lee (ep 40)Douglas Rushkoff (ep 41) Karen O’Brien (ep 42) Darren Sharpe (ep 43)David Pollock (ep 44) Miriam Lyons, Ian Dunlop and Jan Owen AM (ep 45) on The System, by the Public Opinion Afro OrchestraKate Raworth (ep 46) Economic Man vs Humanity a Puppet Rap Battle, a collaboration between Kate Raworth, puppet designer Emma Powel, and song-writer Simon PanruckerAmy (ep 47)Katherine Trebeck (ep 48) Frank Fisher (ep 50)Hazel Henderson (ep 49 & 50) What If? (Impact: The Musical), by Jacqueline Emerson and co. (Hazel’s choice)Jake Claro (ep 51) on Food, by Land of Milk and Honey.Due to licencing restrictions, most of our guests’ nominated music can only be played on radio or similarly licenced broadcasts. Title slide: Anthony introducing episode 48 live at The Platform in Perth (pic: Joni Sercombe).Find more:To access the full catalogue of episodes, head to our website or wherever you get your podcasts.Send us a textSupport the showThe RegenNarration is independent, ad-free and freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber to help keep the show on the road - and gain access to a great community and some exclusive benefits - on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find my writing). You can also donate directly via the website (avoiding fees) or PayPal. I hope to see you at an event, and even The RegenNarration shop. And thanks for sharing with friends!

Jake Claro is the Director of the Vermont Farm to Plate Program, widely regarded as the most comprehensive state-wide food system plan in the United States, and the only one with full government engagement. It is approaching the end of its first decade, and gearing up for the next, with a growing global reputation. The program takes a coordinated, long-term and collaborative approach with all parts of the food system - beyond a simple focus on agricultural output. Since 2010, and in the wake of the GFC, as so many communities and industries have struggled, the program has helped Vermont achieve enormous value – such as a rise in local food purchases of around 75%, 742 new businesses, over 6.5k new jobs in food-related industries, and a sharp reduction in the increasingly critical area of food insecurity. And that’s just the quantifiable stuff - all on the basis of improving the health of people and country.Jake himself is a recipient of the Rachel Carson award at the Bard Centre for Environmental Policy, sits on a multitude of boards, and shares the story here of his instructive beginnings in this work. Jake will be a special guest at the Food for Thought Festival in Albany, Western Australia, between the 19th and 23rd of March 2020. For that and other possible dates around Australia, stay tuned to our partners supporting the production of this episode - Community Food Events, the Food for Thought Festival, Sustain: the Australian Food Network, Commonland, and the Centre for Social Impact at UWA. Title slide: Jake Claro, Farm to Plate Director at the Vermont Sustainable Jobs Fund provides an update on the next 10 years of Vermont Farm to Plate, at the recent annual gathering (supplied).Music:Food, by Land of Milk & Honey.Concluding tune by Jeremiah Johnson.Due to licencing restrictions, our guest’s nominated music can only be played on radio or similarly licenced broadcasts of this episode. Find more:Vermont Farm to Plate Program.Vermont Sustainable Jobs Fund.Food for Thought Festival.Send us a textSupport the showThe RegenNarration is independent, ad-free and freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber to help keep the show on the road - and gain access to a great community and some exclusive benefits - on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find my writing). You can also donate directly via the website (avoiding fees) or PayPal. I hope to see you at an event, and even The RegenNarration shop. And thanks for sharing with friends!

Welcome to episode 50 of The RegenNarration podcast! Which also commemorates the 76th anniversary of the birth of pioneering Australian systems thinker, and the man who introduced Anthony to the work of Hazel Henderson, the late Professor Frank Fisher. Fittingly then, this dual milestone episode features part 2 of Anthony’s conversation with Hazel.Hazel and Anthony delve deeper here into 3 key systems – money, media & mind – including the growing momentum behind reclaiming media and the internet as ‘public square’, the powerful resurgence underway in public banking, and some brilliant and at times surprising ways we can think about opportunities for regeneration. More of Hazel’s story is interwoven throughout this conversation, including how being a concerned mother led to her becoming an activist, later evolving into one of the world’s most respected figures in this space.Title slide: Hazel Henderson (supplied). Music:What If? (Impact: the Musical), by Jacqueline Emerson & co. – watch the film clip.And for the free ebook version of The Purpose of Capital, by Jed Emerson, that the musical was inspired by.The acoustic tune accompanying this episode is by Jeremiah Johnson.Find more:Part 1 of Anthony's conversation with Hazel Henderson (with some additional links in the show notes).Note: Ecor’s website, mentioned by Hazel, is now www.ecorusa.com.Send us a textSupport the showThe RegenNarration is independent, ad-free and freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber to help keep the show on the road - and gain access to a great community and some exclusive benefits - on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find my writing). You can also donate directly via the website (avoiding fees) or PayPal. I hope to see you at an event, and even The RegenNarration shop. And thanks for sharing with friends!