Woodland natives Jon and Tristan Noyes recently spoke, along with world-renowned food experts Stephen Ritz, Raj Patel, and Anthony Bourdain, at a two-day global leadership conference in Milan, Italy, regarding food and its worldwide impact.
The summit, which took place in early July, was one of Education First’s many worldwide events, in which students are invited to tour unique international locales, participate in various group activities, and listen to keynote speeches from notable global figures.
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- The owners of Woodland’s Gromaine, LLC farm, brothers Jon and Tristan Noyes, were recently invited to speak at a global summit with world-renowned figures in the food industry such as Raj Patel, Stephen Ritz, and Anthony Bourdain. The farm, seen here on Aug. 11, grows everything from wheat and cabbage, to kale and potatoes. (Christopher Bouchard)
Jon and Tristan Noyes, aged 27 and 34 respectively, own Gromaine, LLC, a farm based in Woodland that provides everything from potatoes and carrots, to kale, pumpkins, and garlic. Jon manages the farming side of the business in Woodland while brother Tristan, who lives in South Portland, markets the crops to people and businesses from Maine to Boston.
County natives may recognize the name Noyes from “Noyes Flower and Plant Shoppe” in Caribou, a store owned by Jon and Tristan’s parents.
Tristan Noyes said his parents played a large part in motivating him to get involved in the agricultural business.
“Our parents still own Noyes Flower and Plant Shoppe,” he said, “and they’ve always been growing something, whether it’s flowers, vegetables, or potatoes.”
Noyes added that it was “a big honor” to be invited to participate in the global summit.
Jon Noyes, 27, of Woodland co-owns Gromaine with his brother Tristan, who lives in South Portland. Jon manages the Woodland farm while Tristan works to market the fresh, organic, produce to customers from Maine to Boston. (Courtesy of Gromaine, LLC)
“We were so excited to be invited,” he said via phone recently while driving to see a client in Skowhegan. “They were looking for someone who had a voice in family farms and who could speak to different types of farming methods.”
The brothers gave their presentation, which related to organic farming in northern Maine, to thousands of high school students representing roughly 20 countries across the globe at the Milano Convention Center in Milan.
“We gave students perspective on a small organic farm in northern Maine,” Noyes said. “It was really interesting seeing how that resonated with students coming from all kinds of different backgrounds.”
Tristan Noyes also spoke highly of his brother’s contributions to the summit, and felt that Jon’s agricultural expertise was “really appreciated by the people who were there.”
“There are some very practical things that some people don’t have a sense of when it comes to farming a piece of land,” Tristan Noyes said of his brother’s portion of the Gromaine presentation. “It helps shape your perspective when you have someone who has been there.”
The couple thousand high school students in attendance participated in problem solving activities relating to the “future of food,” the theme of the July event.
“The winning project had a phenomenal idea,” Noyes said, “which was to take drones and use them to capture hydrogen and oxygen from the air, and use that to help water crops. The drones would also be able to target plants and locate which parts of the field need help.”
Nobel Museum Director Olov Amelin congratulated the winning team at the event, rewarding them by putting their project on display at the museum.
“That’s just one of the most incredible prizes you could receive,” Tristan Noyes said. “Any time you involve students in the conversation, you come out with such interesting and dynamic ideas.”
He added that “we could all take a page out of that playbook, and if we did that more often, we may have better ideas that complement our own thoughts on how to increase food production and create more sustainable food practices.”
Though Gromaine is an organic, non-GMO operation, Noyes said he was “fascinated by young people’s opinions” on genetically modified organisms, and felt that both sides of the argument were well represented.
“I thought the people speaking about it were very articulate, and made strong arguments on both sides,” he said, adding that it’s a “healthy debate for everyone to be a part of.”
Tristan Noyes recalled attending a workshop with his brother in which two students with vastly different opinions had a civil discussion about GMOs.
“I saw a girl, whose parents were scientists that work in the Midwest to create GMO seeds, talk to a student who was clearly anti-GMO,” Tristan said. “It’s a complicated debate for so many different reasons, and it was great to see these two people talking to one another.”
While the Noyes brothers were in two sessions with Anthony Bourdain, they did not guet a chance to speak with the traveling Food Network star. Tristan Noyes, however, said that Bourdain, along with Stephen Ritz and Raj Patel, gave “eye opening” presentations.
Tristan Noyes, 34, of South Portland co-owns Gromaine with his brother Jon, who manages the farm in Woodland. Tristan works with Jon to market the produce to customers and businesses from Maine to Boston. (Courtesy of Gromaine, LLC)
Bourdain, according to Noyes, gave a keynote address relating to the profound impact of traveling and breaking down cultural barriers through food.
“He said he had done almost no traveling until his mid-40s,” Noyes said, “but it has impacted his life ever since. He felt that there was no better way to break down cultural misconceptions than to eat food with people from the place you’re traveling to. He encouraged people to get out of their comfort zone, travel somewhere they’ve never thought of traveling, meet locals, explore, and find out what it means to be from that place through the food. You’ll make friends and you’ll overcome a lot of misunderstandings, creating a more positive space for people.”
Stephen Ritz, creator of the Green Bronx Machine, a project that provides fresh food for students in the Bronx and that has created over 2,200 jobs, offered perspectives on the importance of food on a global scale along with activist and journalist Raj Patel, known for authoring a number of books on the global food crisis, including “Stuffed and Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System,” and, most recently “The Value of Nothing: How to Reshape Market Society and Redefine Democracy.”
“Ritz, who is a teacher in the Bronx public school system, basically turned a small garden in the back of his class into a farm,” Noyes said, adding that the New York philanthropist has “essentially increased the graduation rate in his district,” and that he has made a “dramatically positive impact on his community.” Ritz also has met the Pope and was invited to the White House while Barack Obama was president.
Noyes said that Patel “lended an interesting perspective to the history of food, and food production in the future.”
“It was such a cool cross-section of different perspectives,” Noyes said of the keynote speeches.
In addition to co-owning Gromaine, Tristan Noyes serves as executive director of the Maine Grain Alliance, and spoke of grain production during his presentation.
