09/14/06 Children & Nature

Children & Nature. I'm Greg Martin with today's Line On Agriculture. More than 300 educators, health professionals, business leaders and conservationists gathered at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service`s National Conservation Training Center in Shepherdstown, West Virginia last weekend for a National Dialogue on Children and Nature. The discussion focused on outdoor recreation`s positive impact on the health, conservation awareness and character development of children. In his opening remarks - Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne pointed out that too many children are overweight and out of shape. He says fewer teenagers are out fishing and hunting - and he says by working together with groups and organizations - it`s a trend the Department hopes to do something about. KEMPTHORNE: Nature Deficit Disorder. Is that another trend? If it is we can do something about it and the fact that you have all these different groups here is powerful. We just might agree on a few action steps and if we can then significant results will occur. Much of the dialogue was inspired by a book called "Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder" - written by Richard Louv. Getting children in touch with nature is important to the Department of Interior for many reasons - perhaps most importantly - Kempthorne says - because children are future stewards of the land. KEMPTHORNE: There are wonderful organizations that add to conservation of this country but their membership is aging. Where's the next generation that joins their ranks? And so we need to turn some of these trends around so that this wonderful aspect of the United States having National Parks and Wildlife Refuges that we have the next generation of stewards that are coming along to ensure that our second century of parks and refuges is every bit as strong as the first. The dialogue agenda focused on the areas of health, media and culture, education and the urban and built environment children are raised in today. The outcome is to identify opportunities for collaborative action and then find ways to implement them. Kempthorne says finding common bonds in childhood nature experiences is a motivator. KEMPTHORNE: If we will set the rhetoric aside and instead talk about recollections and what we experienced when we were kids in the outdoors, those fishing trips, those camping trips; suddenly we find that we have a common bond. If you can have the common bond then the rhetoric falls away and the results are achieved. That's today's Line On Agriculture. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.