The Business of Botanicals with Ann Armbrecht, PhD

The Business of Botanicals with Ann Armbrecht, PhD
Ann: Plants because they're living entities, they're not just commodities, but they're also commodities, but they offer this opportunity to wake us up to our responsibility to care for ecosystems, the human communities that are part of this world that we all live in.
I definitely think, that you can have really high quality products, that the scale is not so much the determining factor as the quality of attention that's paid.
In my mind the best kind of herbal medicine is if there was a whole lot of small farms like that around the country in communities where we can have a relationship and we can go help harvest and use that medicine to make our own remedies - I mean in my mind that's truly the vision.
Lana: You're listening to Plant Love Radio episode number 76.
Hello friends. I hope you're doing well.
Ann Armbrecht is a former guest of mine who returns today to speak about the new project she's releasing to the world. Ann is a writer and anthropologist whose work explores the relationships between humans and the earth, most recently through here work was plants, herbal medicine and the botanical industry.
In 2016, I connected with Ann through her Kickstarter campaign. Her goal was to document the people and places behind the finished products we find on our supplement shelves in supplement Isles.
The $60,000 that she raised during this campaign became the seed money for the research allowing for creation of a multimedia rich site called Sustainable Herbs Project. A couple of years later, it became a part of the American Botanical Council. In her work Ann asks a lot of questions about our role as citizens of the world and how through our choices about the commodities we buy, we impact the world.
This episode comes out a few days before Ann's new book, The Business of Botanicals. And to celebrate Chelsea Green Publishing has partnered with several amazing plant conservationalists and natural product producers.
As a listener of Plant Love Radio, you have an opportunity to win an amazing prize. It includes a first edition of the Business of Botanicals by Ann Armbrecht. And enrollment to the online herbal immersion program $2,500 value from Chestnut school of herbal medicine, a bookshelf of herbal knowledge $200 value from Chelsea Green Publishing, an array of herbal medicine from Aveena Botanicals, soothing throat spray, and more from HerbPharm, and organic tea package from Pukka Herbs and American Botanical Council academic membership $100 value including subscription to their highly acclaimed journal Herbalgram.
To learn more about the raffle, the prizes, and how to enter please follow all the instructions in the show notes at https://plantloveradio.com/76 and enjoy the interview.
Interview
Ann, good morning. How are you doing?
Ann: I'm good, how are you?
Lana: I'm very well, thank you. I'm delighted that we are talking today about the topic that is really interesting to me. And I know that it's near and dear to your heart.
But I want to remind our listeners that we have had another conversation and our first interview centered about you will creation of the documentary Numen and then the early stages of Sustainable Herb Project. So in the past several years, Sustainable Herbs Project has become a part of American Botanical Council. And I will include the links our previous conversations in the show notes.
But for the new listeners, tell us a little bit of how you got started in the field of herbal medicine. What attracted you as an anthropologist to explore this arena and why?
Ann: So first thank you so much for inviting me on your show again. It's great to be here.
Ann's journey
So I went to the Himalayas right after college to teach in Tibetan refugee schools mostly just because I wanted to travel and had an opportunity to work there. And while I was there I had the opportunity to do research, to write a history of the resettlement of Tibetan refugees in Nepal. And so I did that research which involved interviewing a lot of older Tibetans and that made me curious about anthropology because I'd never studied anthropology. And then that led me back to graduate school to study anthropology which led me back to the Himalayas to do graduate work. And when I was there I was looking at the relationship between villagers and the land in Northeastern Nepal.
And I had a lot of romantic ideas about indigenous knowledge as the answer to everything that's wrong in the West. And of course it's more complicated than that, but I did find that there were these kernels of Wisdom - It felt like wisdom To me about how they related to the land. A relationship of a reciprocity, a sense of the sacred, a sense of limits in there and what they would take from the land you know and things would be an exchange. So I was just deeply Impressed and moved by the way they interacted with a liveness of the world.
And so when I came back and was finishing my doctorate and was disillusioned like so many people coming back to the United States and during that time I went to an herb conference the Northeast women's herb conference through the suggestion of Deb Soule from Aveena botanicals.
And just even in that weekend I was struck by the similarities in the way herbalist about the aliveness of the world and the aliveness of plants. And I was moved by how that was present in my own culture rather than going to a far off place. And so that led me to study herbal medicine really Like I came in as an anthropologist but I entered it as this is the answer to everything kind of way
Lana: Right Right right And so how did you continue with this? What was your herbal journey like?
Ann: So I did an apprentice program with Rosemary Gladstar at Sage mountain. And At the time I thought I want to study and become an herbalist and leave anthropology behind. And so then I signed up for the advanced program. But I found I was spending more time leaving the classes and going for walks in the woods rather than diligently learning about all the parts of the body and all the things like that.
Lana: So as you were learning herbal medicine at some point you started becoming curious about how it comes to lives of many people. And so you ended up creating a documentary and you'll ended up going on a very different path than what most students of herbal medicine follow. Can you talk a little bit more about that?
A different path in herbal medicine
Ann: So as I realized that I was not cut out to be a practitioner I was trying to figure out what my path with herbal medicine was. And Rosemary offered Me a small stipend to do some research around the history of United plant savers.
And as I was doing fascinating conversations with well-known herbalists around how they came to know what they knew about plants I felt like it would make a much more powerful video To share their stories and the stories of the plants rather than me translating it into my written words.
And so that's with Terry Youlk, my husband we produced Numen to really celebrate the wisdom of traditional Western herbalism. And as part of that process this was part of why I wanted to do the film, but it became even more clear when we shared the film for most people Herbal medicine wasn't this philosophy about how to live in right relationship with the earth It was really a product in the supplement aisle. And so we would show the film and people either got it or it was kind of a a nice little story but medicine was what was in the pharmacy or the supplement aisle. And so I realized that to meet that audience I had to go to the supplement aisle and I was thinking of writing a book again because I'm much more a writer than a filmmaker.
Lana: Okay so you're talking about a book and so you do have a new book that is coming out very soon and this book is your personal story but it's also an investigation into global business of herbal supplements and products. And some of the important questions that you bring Up in this book is whether the system delivers on its promise to consumers suppliers and the environment. Can you tell us a little bit more of when you knew that you're ready to write this book and why?Inspiration for the new book
Ann: So a question that I've been curious about for years but really crystallized when I heard Wendell Berry speak in 1995 at the Watershed gathering in Washington DC he said We can't see the forest behind the wood in our house, We can't see the Lake being drained When we turn on the bathtub or shower. Not seeing the consequences of our actions allows us to ignore the moral and ecological responsibilities of our ways of living.
And at the same time or in graduate school I read William Cronin's book nature's metropolis which is about the history of Chicago and how the wheat became severed from the fields and the farmers and it just became something that was traded at a commodities market.
So I was really just curious and drawn to that process by which something that is Part of a community a human and ecological community becomes severed and just becomes a product that's governed by the laws of capital.
And so around that time in the late nineties I was teaching a class at Dartmouth and I had my students pick an object and follow it to the source. And so someone would pick paper or someone picked a safety pin or something. This was kind of before the whole focus on commodities was a topic and so it was kind of new.
And the last day they all presented what they had found and it was numbing You know we were all just kind of stunned by the horrible things that were happening behind these products We just take for granted.
So just this question that really underlies this book is what happens if we put objects back in place - What will that change, What will that awaken in us? And so I had this idea for this book and I wrote this book proposal and I got an agent and she shopped it around and it didn't go anywhere And eventually I spoke with people at Chelsea Green and they said yes this is how we would be interested in it If it was kind of your story woven in with the story of the industry. But they didn't have any funding for me to go travel And so I did as much as I could at home And then finally I just arranged a trip to Eastern Europe to visit these fair wild producers through the help of Joseph Brinkmann at Traditional Medicinals. He introduced me. And so I visited what are called primary producers that the companies that collectors bring their herbs to in Hungary and Poland.
Lana: You said in Hungary and Poland?
Ann: And at the time my plan was this was for a book I was still going to write a book but as I was there I realized that telling these stories in a video form in a shorter version be really important because not everybody can go visit the producers and it could help begin to reconnect the people in the places with the finished product.
I want to add - so there was that whole part of the commodities thing and Wendell Berry and that idea but it's also just personally how I feel in shopping, especially grocery stores. That would like take an object off the shelf a can of beans and feel like these strings pulling the invisible people behind there whose lives were being impacted by my choice into the grocery store cart. And so when I came back from that trip and I was in the tea aisle of our local co-op and I saw Gypsy Cold Care tea Traditional Medicinals and I took it off the shelf and I read it was fair wild certified It had that logo. And then it talked about the wild collectors and I realized I probably had Met them and wander through those fields with some of those collectors. And something shifted. Often when I read labels on a box I don't trust them I think it's just marketing. But this time I knew it was true Cause I'd been there and like this part inside of me relaxed and I thought huh well how does that relate to healing? The way I didn't have to defend against what I didn't know. And so that's really this book it's exploring that.
Lana: Right Right And so one scenario that you discussed in your book is this company in Europe working with the wild crafters but there are a couple of other ones. You talk about the farm in Vermont and then there is a larger company in New Jersey And then there is another company in India. Can you tell us a little bit more about these examples? What points did you want to make by incorporating them Into your book?
Stories that made it into the book
Ann: So first I'll say writing this book is the hardest thing I've ever done for exactly that question. There was both so much material and yet Not so much material because in fact the process is quite straightforward. You harvest, you process, you ship, you process and then you have a finished product. And so it was finding stories where there was enough richness As well as that there was a point that I wanted to make but it was really that there was enough richness And so say Runo the company in Poland I went there twice and just had a really good relationship with the people I met there.
So I visited a large processing facility in New Jersey that was off some crowded highway. And that was my first real exposure to how most processing really takes place and the scale of industrialization. It's just this big room with stainless steel tanks way up, inside the herbs are being extracted in some different ways. And that I shared because It was a surprise to me that level of industrialization which if you're in the industry it's nothing surprising at all.
So how I picked the places to visit dependent on two things like one who would give me access and who was willing to have a visitor come. Because the media doesn't have a great history in the botanical industry. They want to point out everything that's wrong. And I wasn't interested in doing that. I was interested in understanding the challenges of sourcing high quality herbs in a responsible way. And so It depended on people trusting me to do that and then it depended on places I could go and get access to.
So a wonderful part of Both the Sustainable Herbs Program And this book was the opportunity to join Sebastian Pole and Ben Heron in India where they let us travel with them camera's rolling as they visited their producers. And so we first started in a small farm That was one of the most idyllic places I've been in India sort of small kind of permaculture farm where they're growing Brahmi in What were rice fields surrounded by a mixed forest where all these spices I'd never seen nutmeg and all-spice are growing. And from there we traveled on these dusty highways through the Plains of South India to other farms where we would have farmer meetings. And I include the stories of this one farm where this one man had chosen invest a lot of money in field mint And he was making a lot of money And so all of these men had come to this lunch because they wanted to learn how to grow field mint so they could make that amount of money.
Lana: So when you were observing these interactions what were you learning about the system and how it worked and what were some of the lessons that you were noticing?
Ann: The single most important thing I learned was not necessarily how complicated things are because again it's pretty straightforward but how much attention to detail is required like that the labels on the sacks are accurate and that you have the number for the collector. You know these things that are not that interesting to write about but they are what needed to ensure that the herbs that are grown in this field are the ones that are in the finished product because there's so many steps along the way where things can get messed up.
So later we were in India for six months, So much of that trip I didn't include in the book because It was depressing often. We spent two or three weeks I was really excited about this Project in Northwestern Himalayas that where they were the reports described these great efforts to cultivate some endangered Ayurvedic herbs. And I visited the organization in outside of Delhi and these really nice offices and really nice reports. And we went up to these villages and Would ask people to find out more about these projects. And they would say well maybe so-and-so knows about it And that person would say well Oh I remember hearing something And then finally we would meet the person who had maybe a 10 by 10 field where they had these tiny little kutki plants or something. Just it wasn't a viable there was no way that I was going to have an impact on the Ayurvedic market. And then another time in India and I do include this in the book - South of Madurai in the Southern tip of India I was visiting with a trader. He worked with farmers to sell their product to the next level up on the supply chain. And this was all kind of bought and sold in the open market non-certified herbs. And after he showed us the Perry Winkle fields you know which were lovely periwinkle growing in a field he took us to his firecracker sparkler factory which was his other economic enterprise that he was just getting involved in. So these sparkler factories, the buildings are spread out in a field so that if something explodes the whole building doesn't burn down. And we walked back through the field and there was three or four men with their arms dipped in the silver aluminum substance that is used to coat sparklers and their whole bodies were covered in this. And I thought wow So here's this trader who is buying medicinal plants or hiring these laborers whose arms are covered all day long in some really toxic heavy metal chemical. And so I didn't even keep notes from that part of the trip. And I don't want to tell that story - there's nothing hopeful in that.
So what I really tried to do Was out of the places I visited to find the ones where people were paying attention. Later we visited another fair wild project in India where they're working in communities around babitaki and haritaki, two of the main fruits in triphala. And neither of the projects are perfect but what Struck me was the commitment of the people involved to in one case try and find an economic incentive to keep the giant trees standing because this is where the great hornbill nests and they nest for life. And so if those trees can if there can be an economic incentive to keep the tree standing then that also protects the great hornbills.
And so stories like that that have a big vision. Or I visited in Rajistan the projects that Traditional Medicinals has been working on that started around water cause it's their supply for senna but when they got there They saw that there was a shortage of water and the women were spending a lot of time getting water. They wanted high quality senna but you can't get high quality senna if people are poor and spending their whole day stressed because they're carrying water to and from... you have to see the whole community. And so there I tell the story of meeting the women mostly through Neoma Sadler, Drake Sadler's wife. She has this connection with the people there that's quite remarkable.
Lana: Really interesting
Quick break
just a quick reminder here that this episode comes out a few days before Ann's new book, the business of botanicals. This is what we're discussing in today's conversation in today's interview. To celebrate Chelsea Green Publishing has partnered with several amazing plant conservationalist and natural product producers.
As a listener of Plant Love Radio, you have an opportunity to win an amazing prize. It includes a first edition of the Business of Botanicals by Ann Armbrecht. And enrollment to the online herbal immersion program $2,500 value from Chestnut School of Herbal Medicine, a bookshelf of herbal knowledge $200 value from Chelsea Green Publishing, an array of herbal medicine from Aveena Botanicals, soothing throat spray, and more from HerbPharm, and organic tea package from Pukka Herbs and American Botanical Council academic membership $100 value including subscription to their highly acclaimed journal Herbalgram.
To learn more about the raffle, the prizes, and how to enter please follow all the instructions in the show notes at https://plantloveradio.com/76
And now back to our conversation.
Local farms in the book
You also talked about some farms here locally. So you mentioned the farm in Vermont. Can you tell us a little bit more about that and why it made it into a book?
Ann: So Zach Woods Herb Farm - Mel and Jeff Carpenter's farm. So early on I was trying to think I'm an anthropologist... and so participant observation, which means you actually go and do the work and overall really hard to do in a book like this.
From an anthropological point of view I was kind of trying to do multi-sited ethnography but that's really hard you know you drop into a place and then you leave and you don't have a lot of follow through. And so with Mel and Jeff I could go up there and work and I know them, Work at different times of the year. I was there to harvest different plants, calendula, And in the book I talk about harvesting Milky oats and other time harvested nettles and helped wash ashwagandha and smelled the ashwagandha for weeks.
So in the book I'm really trying to ask in the spirit of herbal medicine, that quality of intention make it through a global supply chain. And if so what does that look like? What do I look for? How do you find whether that intention is present In the supplement aisle? And Mel and Jeff on their farm embody that. There's some other small herb farms that definitely have that. I know Mel and Jeff the best And they really embody that. The spirit of the plants is really important, the quality of the soil, the quality of their relationships with The people who work there.
And so that's why it made it in. In my mind I feel like the best kind of herbal medicine is if there was a whole lot of small farms like that around the country in communities where we can have a relationship and we can go help harvest and use that medicine to make our own remedies - I mean in my mind that's truly the vision.
Lana: That's great. I want to talk a little bit more about this - it makes me think of friend of mine who called me a couple of days ago. He was in CVS looking at certain vitamins, herbs and he was asking me if I know what the quality of this particular product is. So for someone like him what would you like an average person to know about the industry? What should be important to them when they are standing in that aisle?
Advice to an average consumer
Ann: It's such a hard question I get asked that all the time - what company to buy from... and people who have been in the industry for years when I asked them they also don't have an easy answer.
I think certifications matter so certified organic - people have questions about the certification and this isn't going to be like vitamin D or that kind of thing; And there are very few certified organic botanicals. But it's a certification that matters because not only does it Say things about the use of pesticides and fertilizers It also requires that there's traceability from the sea to the finished product, that they can trace back to the source so that the certification standards can be followed. And so that means a level of attention is being brought. Fair certifications matter too - fair wild, fair for life, fair trade - again they're not so many in botanicals but those two things matter. To me I personally have certain companies that I have the benefit of really seeing the behind the scenes. And so that helps me trust.
But It doesn't take a whole bunch of work. You could spend an hour like take five companies that you're choosing between and look on their websites and look at their sustainability report which is different than marketing. There's marketing material which can be Very thorough and good - companies like Pukka or HerbPharm or Gaia have a lot of information on their websites.
But their sustainability reports go into that a little more deeply. And they have to talk about things like quality which Means making sure that the plants are being harvested in the right way, at the right time, with the right constituents, so that they're going to do what they claim they're going to do. But also around their commitment to the community and things like that.
So for me I came to herbal medicine because it was so empowering because growing my own plant, making my own medicine, I was like wow I can do this in my own kitchen. And that made me feel so much better than just buying a product on the shelf in the same way knowing where that Gypsy Cold Care tea came from.
And so I feel like if we all shift from just being a consumer taking the product what's it going to do for me to taking the time to investigate a little bit learn a little bit more Then we kind of go from just being a consumer to maybe be more of a citizen, a participant... cause then we see Oh by buying this product it's not just that this elderberry is going to keep me healthy in the winter but by buying this product I'm helping this company stay in business. And that company's having a good impact in the communities by paying a fair wage or providing a contract beyond a three month season or something like that or really caring investing in the soil health. And those connections to me they're empowering, They help heal in that way that I felt different when I knew where the gypsy cold care tea came from.
Lana: You're reminding us that Everything is truly interconnected and that when we are using our wallets and when we are supporting certain companies that are doing really amazing work in the world that we are helping them to stay alive and to bring more of this beauty into our world. Most herbalists always feel that when the plans are treated right, when the humans are treated right that our healing is actually a lot faster And once again all more interconnected.
So you mentioned that if you can go on the website of several different companies and really look at not just marketing reports but their sustainability reports that this would be a first step Am I correct? Okay And then the next one is really supporting these companies that you feel are doing all this really positive and really beneficial work...
Ann: Yes and though... asking questions So Like if it's a wild harvested plant if you're buying something with black cohosh and or golden seal, right. And you want to know, is it wild harvested, or are they buying from a cultivated source? Ask them. So I did this exercise with black cohosh and I looked on Amazon for like 10 different companies or 20 different companies and I sent them a message in their chat box or whatever email. And I said, well, where's your brother cohosh from, is it wild harvested or cultivated? And nine out of 10 wrote back and said, Oh, it's cultivated.
Which is not very likely. Most black cohosh is wild harvested. And so I didn't follow up on that, but if everybody wrote companies and said, Oh, Is your plant, is it wild? Harvested? How do you know where's it from? Or is it certified organic? Why isn't it? Why don't you buy certified organic raw material?
On the Sustainable Herbs Program website, I have questions to contact companies and ask them not necessarily because you'll get a good answer because usually it's marketing people, not the purchasing people or sourcing people.
But then they'll begin to know, Oh, consumers are asking these questions, concerns about sustainability, mean that a whole bunch more companies are now talking about sustainability than they were before. And that doesn't mean they're necessarily talking about it in really rigorous terms, but they're beginning to talk about it.
They recognize they have to address these issues. And now with regenerative farming, there's much more to, okay, how are the soil is being cared for? So I feel like the more one you understand what the issues are, and then you ask to get answers, to know what companies are doing to address those issues.
Lana: That's great. Thank you. So, one of the most important questions that your book brings up is whether the health benefits of medicinal herbs can be preserved when the production expands to industrial scale. Can you share your thoughts based on everything that you have learned?
Health benefits and industrial scale production
Ann: I definitely think, that you can have really high quality products, that the scale is not so much the determining factor as the quality of attention that's paid. Each step of the way you could have a small farm like Zach woods that then maybe sells to a smaller tincture making company. It could be a fantastic product, or it could be a horrible product if the farmers aren't paying attention.
Similarly you can have large scale, scale up and as long as people are paying attention that the constituents aren't being lost you can have a high-quality.
I think values come into that. I personally am more drawn to smaller scale farming rather than a much larger farm. And there's questions now about that and the relationship between monocrops of say calendula, and a small diversified farm say like Zach Wood's farm is the calnendula the same or different? And how do you measure that?
Nobody's really measured that. I have a bias for smaller scale that might be reaffirmed in research now around the health of the soil and mycorrhiza networks and all of that. But there's not that evidence right now.
So some of its values is really getting clear. Do I want to support small farmers in India? If so, it could be a big scale, like a Pukka, because they're really committed to working in those communities in a way that becomes like a small scale, if that makes sense.
So to me, it's more like these little pockets. If those pockets of connection between people and plants are maintained through the whole supply that's the main question. Once it becomes a commodity and it's just a commodity, which doesn't seem like what herbalists came to herbalism to use.
Lana: And I think it's interesting... I agree that herbalists don't think of herbs as commodity. But you've had examples of where even wild crafters and small farmers the plans are not treated with the same level of respect. And so you're losing a lot on quality.
So I think what's important for us to recognize that there are larger companies really doing impressive job at maintaining the quality and putting a lot of their own time and resources and efforts to do that. And then there are also smaller farms that are also doing this type of work.
Practical strategies from Ann's explorations
Ann, so we talked about a lot of lessons that you have learned, but for our listeners that are walking away from this conversation, from this interview, what are some of the practical strategies that someone can take to really embrace these concepts into their life, even without doing the amount of research and investigation that you have done on your end?
Ann: Yeah, it's such a good question. And it's surprisingly hard to answer. But I would say the first thing is to get a pot with a plant and put it in your window sill. So it could be thyme make time tea. And just begin if you aren't already doing that. If you're already doing that grow a garden and do all of that. But growing plants and developing that relationship is the most important.
Second what I personally do is I have favorite tea companies that I trust the quality of their product, and that's what I buy. I stick with that. I have tincture companies that I trust their product and I buy. And capsules, it gets a little trickier, but same thing. So I would really take a bit of time and decide which companies meet your values then have really high quality product. And kind of stick with that because then it becomes easier. You don't have that decision making process to revisit every time you go shopping.
Lana: And I really liked that recommendation. And I also follow exactly the same strategy that I buy from set of few companies that I really trust, and I learn a lot about them. And so sometimes it becomes a little difficult because there are new companies that come on the market that have really good values. And so you learn about them. And I also listened to a lot of people like yourself that are actually in the industry and ask their recommendation for good companies that are really doing their work.
Additional resources for more sustainable and regenerative practices
You mentioned the Sustainable Herbs Project have questions that consumers can ask by contacting the companies. Are there other resources that you would like our audience to explore, to continue learning more about this?
Ann: A few years ago when this Sustainable Herbs Project became part of the American Botanical Council and it's renamed, it's now the Sustainable Herbs Program. It's a program of the American botanical council. And so resources this past year, we started this webinar series that really was launched around this toolkit that I created that was directed at companies wanting to implement more sustainable and regenerative practices.
So we have this series, that's talking to leaders, different people in the industry really trying to move the needle. And those are actually quite interesting because it's a chance to hear from people at all levels, farmers, CEOs, and those are available on the sustainable herbs program website.
We also started this series on ethnobotany, and ethobotany in a way is a misnomer. It's really about the cultural framework within which medicinal plants are used. The botanical industry is one particular framework, but there's lots of other different systems and ways of knowing.
And so it's really to have conversations with people who have spent time doing that kind of research and sharing what they've learned and insights often from indigenous practices and what we can learn from that around respect and reciprocity and things like that. And those are available on the website as well.
And then we have a whole lot of videos that show each step of the supply, the journey plants make. And a lot of the stories I tell in the book have videos on the website. And I'm actually thinking of putting together a kind of curriculum that combines chapters of the books. With the videos to make it easier to follow that.
Lana: That would be a lot of fun - can you tell us the address for the program?
Ann: https://sustainableherbsprogram.org
Lana: okay. Wonderful. Thank you. How our listeners can get their hands on this book?
Ann: Sure. I have a website https://annarmbrecht.com, which has links to where you can buy the book. Best places, your local bookstore or my local bookstore Bear Pond Books in Montpelier, Vermont. Then you can also order wherever you choose to order your books, Amazon, Barnes and Noble or directly from Chelsea Green, which is the publisher.
Lana: Okay. That's great. So this episode will go live before the book is actually released. So our listeners can pre-order the book that's correct?
Ann: Yeah, so pre-orders are great because it helps with the whole metrics of how books get sold, too. If you're interested in buying the book, you can support it by pre-ordering.
Lana: Wonderful. Thank you. As we are coming to an end of this conversation, do you have any partying thoughts for us? Any words of wisdom, anything that maybe we have not touched upon during this discussion? Anything that you want to leave our audience with?
Ann: So I do a lot of dance of sort of more ecstatic dance and was at a workshop with Yaakov Darling, who is a movement medicine practitioner from the United Kingdom. And he said in the eighties and nineties, when he first started doing this dance with Gabriele Roth people dance to go into trance.
And then he said, now what's needed is to dance as a way to wake up from the trance that we're kind of in as consumers, to wake up to see that we're citizens of the world. And I kind of talked about this before, but I feel like plants because they're living entities, they're not just commodities, but they're also commodities, but they offer this opportunity to wake us up to our responsibility to care for ecosystems, the human communities that are part of this world that we all live in.
Lana: Thank you. Ann, thank you so much. Thank you for the wisdom. Thank you for all the efforts that you put into this project and into bringing the awareness to everyone. Thank you again.
Thank you for listening!
Thank you so much for joining us today. I hope you've enjoyed this conversation with Dr. Ann Armbrecht. To get to all the resources discussed in today's interview or to get to the information about the giveaway and raffle please head over to the show notes at https://plantloveradio.com/76.
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