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AgricultureThaT Looks To The FuTurecArlo petriniSlow Food preSident6 AlMAnACCoThe stories you’ll read as you leaf through the pages of this Almanac carry a mes- sage of hope. Feeding the planet is possible. And it can be done without using up our resources and impoverishing communities. It can be done while maintaining the soil’s fertility, the purity of the air, diverse varieties of plants and animals and the well-being of rural people.LEt’s start from biodivErsityOur response to the question of how to guarantee enough food for the planet is based on one foundation: biodiversity. Biodiversity is humanity’s greatest insur- ance for the future. Without biodiversity, we would lose the very foundations for human life on the planet, not to mention the base materials on which human civilizations and cultures are constructed, with natural diversity transformed into cultural, artistic, landscape and, ultimately, human diversity.Protecting and promoting biodiversity is not one choice among many, an option for conservation intellectuals or nostalgic environmentalists. Instead it is the only possible path, a moral responsibility that we must shoulder for the future genera-© MArCo dEl CoMUnE