Henkjan Laats is the director of the organization Cross Cultural Bridges (CCB), owner of the Cacaomuseum Amsterdam, Board member of the Food Council Amsterdam and of the organization Food that Matters. He is also “Holistic Science” specialist for the UN programme Harmony with Nature and member of the network organizations World Connectors and Earth Charter.
Since primary school in The Netherlands his main fascination is the Amazon rainforest. He studied tropical Soil and Water Management and got a PhD on social learning and conflict transformation at the Wageningen University, and he worked in Ecuador, Costa Rica, Nepal, Peru and Bolivia. In 2005 with his Peruvian friend and colleague Gustavo Hernandez, he founded the organization Cross Cultural Bridges, with the aim to transfer initiatives and wisdom from the global South to the global North, with a main focus on the Andes-Amazon philosophy and way of life called Sumay Kausay, Buen Vivir, or Good Bio-Centered Living.
CCB envisions a world in which people in the North and the South act together based on solidarity, complementarity and responsibility, and strive towards economic equity and respectful living together, as a bio-centered society (humans as an integral part of Nature).
In the aforementioned context Henkjan has activities on food and agricultural transition, conflict transformation, and land and water issues, working with a variety of actors such as youth activists, indigenous leaders, farmers, cooking chefs, artists, and immigrants. As a holistic thinker and do-er, he embraces creativity and complexity, and tries to give inputs to transitions which contribute to Buen Vivir.
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