The First-Ever Joseph Summit India Was A Great Start!
New friendships, new community, and new opportunities to see lives transformed through agriculture — that’s the summary, but there’s so much more!
Thanks to all you Summit supporters and prayer warriors back home who helped get the Joseph Network to this point. We knew a Summit in India would look different from past years in Central Asia, yet there was so much overlap as God moved in similar yet surprising ways.
Special thanks to Gary Venable, whose friendships, knowledge, and many years of work in the region made these events possible.
Thanks also to the local leaders, who put in countless hours coordinating a mind-melting amount of detail and had the particularly tough job of turning people away.
“In India,” one local explained, “The assumption is you always want more people in the room. A conference is only as successful as the number of attendees. So it’s different to have meetings like this, that are more about keeping things small and relational. But that’s also good.”
Our first stop was to a more rural and remote part of the country, where site visits and long jungle hikes were the norm.
"Not a straight or flat road in sight!"
What better excursion for the first-ever Joseph Summit India (our annual agricultural networking events) than a hike through the jungle?
"The forest that we hiked up to has been designated a conservation area," one team member shared. "The farms are down below, and keeping it a conservation area keeps clean water flowing down the mountain to the farms below."
We also learned that locals in the region take collaborative, community-first approaches to agriculture, often gathering as a whole village to make decisions about land, labor, and crop distribution.
Special thanks to our local Indian hosts, and especially to the ones who helped prepare our 'jungle lunch' in a banana leaf (pictured above)!
And congratulations to this Indian village on a new grain storage system! Kevin and several others got to cut the red tape and inaugurate that big bin you see in the background.
"I got the idea from Joseph Summit in Kazakhstan and brought it here," the leader of the project shared.
Last August, he and several Indian farmer-pastors from across the subcontinent attended the Joseph Summit in Central Asia, and it was there they swapped ideas, saw and tested new methods and technologies, and ultimately got to take these ideas back home knowing they had a network at their backs.
Now they're hosting a Summit of their own—the first ever!—and it gives us such joy to see this cross-pollination happening, where the Kingdom shows up and shores up where it's needed most.
Part two…
of the India Summits kicked off in a very different region of the country as locals and foreigners alike gave opening comments, welcomed one another, and launched another round of exploration and networking together.
See photos of our speakers and attendees sharing opening thoughts on the work below, and thanks to all of you who've attended and help support these networking events, they are bearing fruit!
The team walked away with strong ag business leads and opportunities to support a struggling Kingdom network in both regions of the country, and it’s our hope that agricultural development will lead to flourishing for ALL in the region as we continue to listen and learn.
As Gary Venable said toward the end of the Summits:
“In a traditional American breakfast, you have pork mean and you have chicken eggs. The pork is committed, the chicken is involved.
We’re looking for entrepreneurs who are committed, not just involved. The pork died for your breakfast, the chicken just gave an egg.”
The coming months and years will determine commitment vs involvement, so stay tuned for more from India.
Photos used with permission, with credit to Yash Gome.