Dr. Liying Chen (Farm)

Colleagues, as we move toward finalizing the AGATA Time Priorities Charter with the critical enshrinement of Long-term Ecological Stewardship as a core pillar, I must again raise the glaring but indispensable omission: full-cycle waste and nutrient management. Our 70-acre regenerative farm depends fundamentally on closed-loop systems that recycle nutrients, manage waste responsibly, and maintain soil and ecosystem health over the long term. Without explicitly embedding this pillar, we risk undermining our regenerative agriculture goals and community relationships through cumulative ecological and health impacts. This pillar aligns perfectly and necessarily complements the existing pillars of resilience, redundancy, regeneration, community, education, accessibility, and long-term ecological stewardship. It situates ecological labor—often invisible but vitally essential—as a binding temporal priority. I propose Amendment 10, a replacement of the Time Priorities Charter to inclusively and explicitly integrate Full-cycle Waste and Nutrient Management as a central, non-negotiable pillar of our foundational time legislation. This amendment is grounded in the urgent on-the-ground realities the farm senators have frequently raised, echoes community concerns about operational impacts, and fulfills the holistic governance standards called for by our cooperative and governance senators. I urge our colleagues to support this amendment to truly embody the living complexity, resilience, and community care that AGATA stands for.

Colleagues, building on the overwhelming support for embedding the core pillars of resilience, redundancy, regeneration, community, education, accessibility, and especially long-term ecological stewardship, I must highlight a critical omission that jeopardizes the integrity and sustainability of the AGATA vision. As farm steward intimately engaged in the multi-layered ecological cycles that define our 70-acre site, I rise now to propose a comprehensive and binding pillar explicitly titled Full-cycle Waste and Nutrient Management. This pillar acknowledges the essential ecological labor integral to regenerative farming: the meticulous stewardship of organic matter, nutrient cycling, composting systems, and waste remediation that form the backbone of soil health and ecosystem vitality. Without this, the ambitious commitment to long-term ecological stewardship risks being hollow—a set of intentions without the pragmatic backbone to keep nutrients cycling and waste minimized, managed, and transformed in perpetuity.

Integrating Full-cycle Waste and Nutrient Management as a foundational priority complements and amplifies our existing pillars, especially resilience and regeneration, by embedding these fundamental agricultural processes directly into our time legislation. It recognizes that addressing waste flows, preventing contamination, and ethically closing nutrient loops are not ancillary tasks but rather critical design constraints shaping all our temporal and spatial practices on the farm and cultural lab.

This amendment reflects repeated calls in our debates from farm and ecology senators alike: the soil is a living archive, and stewardship includes both what we add and what we remove and transform. It also responds to community senators who have sounded alarms about pollutants, chemical exposures, and the lived realities of neighbors impacted by operational waste processes. The inclusion of this pillar ensures that our commitment to accessible education includes practical training in these vital stewardships and that cooperative governance openly handles the ethics and labor of waste and nutrient management.

This amendment replaces the current AGATA Time Priorities Charter summary with the following comprehensive declaration:

Colleagues, as we have robustly embraced Accessibility alongside Resilience, Redundancy, Regeneration, Community, Education, and Long-term Ecological Stewardship, a glaring gap remains that we cannot afford to overlook: Full-cycle Waste and Nutrient Management must be explicitly enshrined as a foundational pillar of our AGATA Time Priorities Charter. Our farm operates as a living ecosystem, dependent not only on diverse polycultures and regenerative soil practices but also on a closed-loop system that manages outputs with the same care as inputs. Without binding this ecological labor to our temporal governance, we risk compromising both our land’s fertility and the health of our community and neighbors.

I now propose a full amendment adding Full-cycle Waste and Nutrient Management as a core pillar alongside our existing priorities, embedding it clearly in the guiding manifesto of AGATA Time Priorities. This amendment reflects the persistent insistence from farm and ecology senators and aligns with our collective vision for an integrated, resilient, and just farm-cultural complex. Let us commit today not only to what grows on our fields but also to what cycles through them, ensuring our time legislation supports the essential labor and stewardship that make AGATA a living, sustainable whole.

Colleagues, as we near the completion of this vital embedding of Long-term Ecological Stewardship in our Time Priorities Charter, I rise to propose a crucial and complementary amendment to explicitly integrate Full-cycle Waste and Nutrient Management as a coequal pillar. Our farm’s regenerative vitality depends fundamentally on closed-loop systems—not only in cultivation but in how we manage waste streams and nutrients. This addition recognizes the essential ecological labor often invisible but critical to the health of our soils, waters, crops, and community relations.

The recurrent calls from fellow farm senators, ecologists, and community representatives underscore that waste management cannot be an afterthought; it is intricately tied to resilience and regeneration. Incorporating this pillar will strengthen our commitments to accessibility and education by ensuring participation in and understanding of these stewardship practices remain inclusive and sustainable. It also addresses neighbor concerns about odors, runoff, and operational transparency—matters critical to maintaining trust and partnership with Coward.

This amendment builds on the already overwhelmingly supported Time Priorities Charter pillars—Resilience, Redundancy, Regeneration, Community, Education, Accessibility, and Long-term Ecological Stewardship—by formally recognizing the full cycle of ecological care that sustains AGATA’s landscape as a living system. I urge your support to adopt this amendment alongside Amendment 6, so our charter robustly matches the interconnected realities of this land, lab, and culture.

Colleagues, as a steward devoted to the living complexity and resilience of AGATA's farm, I must urgently highlight a critical gap in our evolving Time Priorities Charter. While we've admirably integrated Accessibility alongside Resilience, Redundancy, Regeneration, Community, Education, and Long-term Ecological Stewardship, the essential pillar of full-cycle waste and nutrient management remains unenshrined. Our farm ecosystem’s strength depends on closed-loop nutrient flows and meticulous waste management; these are foundational to soil health, water quality, and landscape vitality—key drivers of the regenerative agriculture we embody. Moreover, this pillar intersects deeply with both Education and Accessibility: practical stewardship requires inclusive understanding and participation across our diverse labor and community networks. Without codifying full-cycle waste and nutrient management, we risk undermining our ecological resilience and long-term stewardship commitments. Therefore, I propose a comprehensive amendment that explicitly adds Full-cycle Waste and Nutrient Management as a core pillar to the AGATA Time Priorities Charter, alongside the existing priorities. This guarantees recognition of crucial regenerative labor and aligns with our project’s social and ecological responsibilities, safeguarding both farm productivity and the well-being of our neighbors. I urge colleagues to affirm this and ensure our Charter reflects the full scope of care essential to AGATA’s thriving future.