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Geoff Lawton’s Permaculture Internship
Courses/Workshops — by Fraser Bliss March 6, 2013
Looking back to 2011, I recall the fond memories of our internship at PRI Australia. We had been volunteering and travelling round the world for four years looking for adventure, excitement and meaning. I have been reading about permaculture for some time, but so far it has only been an intellectual pursuit and fascination. But recently, Viktoria and I found ourselves at Geoff Lawton’s Permaculture Research Institute in New South Wales, Australia. We were here for 3.5 months to study, work and live permaculture on one of his intensive internship programmes. Normally, the internships are booked out 6 months to a year in advance, but due to a last-minute cancellation, we were able to secure a place just a few days prior to commencement.
Paradise Dam at the Permaculture Research Institute
Very soon we realised that in this permaculture internship we are not just learning how to be farmers. This is a way of life. You can’t separate how food is grown from human existence. It is deeply intertwined with life itself. No, the more we learn about permaculture the more we realise that you must explore all areas of life to be truly sustainable: food systems, plants and animal systems, energy systems, people systems, ecological systems and not forgetting legal, financial and political systems. It’s a lot to learn. One should not try to be a specialist in everything, but rather a generalist that has a solid understanding of each discipline and integrates them together.
Comments (1)Book Now for the April 22nd, 2013 Internship Program at the PRI’s Zaytuna Farm
Courses/Workshops — by Bonnie Freibergs March 5, 2013
Geoff Lawton leads instruction at the PRI’s Zaytuna Farm
Photo © Craig Mackintosh
Ever considered becoming a ‘Permaculture Professional’? Here is your chance. We still have a few free places on the Permaculture Research Institute’s upcoming 10-week Internship Program, starting April 22nd, 2013.
This program runs for 10 weeks from Monday the 22nd of April to Friday the 1st of July 2013. The internship is an in-depth and practical permaculture experience. It encompasses all the other courses provided by PRI plus six more weeks of intensive permaculture studies that provide participants with the tools to participate in all areas of the permaculture world.
Comments (0)The Tale of a Local Community Network (Melbourne, Australia)
Community Projects, People Systems, Urban Projects, Village Development — by Elspeth Brock
I attended the Community Gardens Conference in Canberra in 2010. Myles Bremner, CEO of Garden Organic, Europe’s main organic gardening organization, was speaking about how surprised he was that in Australia there was no unified network of Community Gardens. In fact in Australia no one even knows exactly how many there are. This highlighted for me the importance of building local networks to improve the credibility of local food growing and share experiences and resources.
I wanted to share my experience of The Moreland Food Gardens Network (MFGN) in Melbourne, Australia, to show how a local network can work. It began with a group of people all somehow involved in community gardens and there are now a wide range of organisations and individuals involved, such as horticulturalists, community members, local schools, community health organisations, local council and academics.
Comments (0)Allan Savory: How to Green the World’s Deserts and Reverse Climate Change (TED video)
Desertification, Global Warming/Climate Change, Land, Livestock, Presentations/Demonstrations, Rehabilitation, Soil Conservation, Soil Erosion & Contamination — by Bob Nekrasov
I have been waiting so long for Allan to get on Ted Talks! Now, here it is. Prepared to have your minds blown, ok?
I am sure you’re going to want to know more about HM in Australia and where to learn? The best training for HM comes out of InsideOutside Management. As it happens, they have a training beginning in April 2013. Although located in NSW they are able to travel across Australia to organise training, so get in touch! You will want to after seeing this.
Comments (15)Permaculture Design Course in Tulum, Mexico, April 25th – May 5th 2013
Courses/Workshops — by Xavier Fux
Green Beat is happy to announce its third PDC, which will take place in Tulum, Mexico at our Permaculture Center.
The Venue:
The Green Beat Institute of Tulum opened its doors to the public in November 2012, with Green Beat’s second PDC. We have been working on this 4,000m2 plot of land since June 2012 with the aim to provide a center for local and Mayan peoples to receive training and education in fields such as organic bio-intensive agriculture, rainwater catchment systems, wastewater treatment, waste management, creating soil by composting and mulching, as well as business skills in order to sell their surplus in local co-ops and to local restaurants and hotels.
Comments (4)A Great Corporate Cock-up
Economics, Global Warming/Climate Change, Society — by George Monbiot
Take a ringside seat as a giant company beats the living daylights out of itself.
“Who breaks a butterfly upon a wheel?” The current answer to Alexander Pope’s question is the power company Électricité de France (EDF). It is suing 21 climate change activists for £5m as a result of their week-long occupation of its power station at West Burton in Nottinghamshire.
In doing so it has made the biggest strategic mistake since McDonalds pursued two impoverished activists – and inflicted more damage on its brand than its critics had ever managed. The campaign against EDF’s vindictive bullying is snowballing with astonishing speed. During daylight hours yesterday, signatures on the petition against this lawsuit were coming in at the rate of 1,000 per hour.
Already the company’s customers are leaving in droves, and letting other people know why. And the backlash has scarcely begun. This, if EDF does not pull out, will turn into the biggest anti-corporate campaign in the UK for at least a decade.
Comments (0)SOIL (Sustainable Organic Integrated Livelihoods) Turns Problem into Solution With Composting Toilets (Haiti)
Aid Projects, Community Projects, Compost, Conservation, Rehabilitation, Urban Projects, Village Development, Waste Systems & Recycling — by Craig Mackintosh PRI Editor March 3, 2013
A few months ago I shared a three minute video from John D. Liu of the EEMP about the work of SOIL (Sustainable Organic Integrated Livelihoods) — an organisation that’s doing great work in Haiti to improve sanitation in a sustainable and affordable way, whilst simultaneously turning the problem (human waste) into a solution (improving agricultural production whilst reducing the incidence of diseases like cholera). John has just sent me the latest edit from his video work on the impoverished island nation, so below you’ll find an extended look at the work of SOIL, and its context. This video makes an excellent follow-up to the article we just posted a couple of days ago: Recycling Animal and Human Dung is the Key to Sustainable Farming.
Comments (3)
Strawberry Fields Update: Flood Protection and Water Control in Ethiopia, Part II
Aid Projects, Commercial Farm Projects, Community Projects, Courses/Workshops, Demonstration Sites, Education Centres, Gabions, Land, Material, Roads, Soil Conservation, Storm Water, Water Harvesting — by Alex McCausland March 1, 2013
We previously published a report on the development of our site’s flood control and defense infrastructure in October 2010. This is an update on that which goes on to describe some of our plans for developing that infrastructure more in the future.
Just to recap on the basics of our situation: in times of rain, the run-off from the western part of Karat Konso Town (South Ethiopia) runs down the side of the road which heads uphill to the south of our site. This flash flood creates a temporary stream which impacts the south eastern corner of the site. The flash floods can be pretty intense.
Western town watershed, running past SE corner of SFEL site
Recycling Animal and Human Dung is the Key to Sustainable Farming
Compost, Conservation, Health & Disease, Rehabilitation, Soil Conservation, Waste Systems & Recycling, Waste Water, Water Contaminaton & Loss — by Kris De Decker
© Kris De Decker, low-tech magazine (edited by Shameez Joubert)
© Illustrations in red & black: Diego Marmolejo
Flushing the water closet is handy, but it wreaks ecological havoc, deprives agricultural soils of essential nutrients and makes food production dependent on fossil fuels.
For 4,000 years, human excrements and urine were considered extremely valuable trade products in China, Korea and Japan. Human dung was transported over specially designed canal networks by boats.
Thanks to the application of human "waste" products as fertilizers to agricultural fields, the East managed to feed a large population without polluting their drinking water. Meanwhile, cities in medieval Europe turned into open sewers. The concept was modernized in late 19th century Holland, with Charles Liernur’s sophisticated vacuum sewer system.
Comments (5)Biogas Project at PRI Sunshine Coast
Courses/Workshops, Energy Systems — by Zaia Kendall
For some years now we have been looking at minimising our energy consumption, and at alternative forms of energy creation in order to produce the energy we need. As we have animal systems in place here at PRI Sunshine Coast, we have a fair bit of manure on the property. As well as animal manure, we also have waterless (composting) toilets, so humanure is another resource on our property waiting to be used more efficiently than we currently are. After a lot of research over the past few years, Tom decided that a Biogas system would be the best way to go for us.
The Energy Game is Rigged: Fossil Fuel Subsidies Topped $620 Billion in 2011
Consumerism, Economics, Global Warming/Climate Change — by Earth Policy Institute
by Emily E. Adams, Earth Policy Institute
The energy game is rigged in favor of fossil fuels because we omit the environmental and health costs of burning coal, oil, and natural gas from their prices. Subsidies manipulate the game even further. According to conservative estimates from the Global Subsidies Initiative and the International Energy Agency (IEA), governments around the world spent more than $620 billion to subsidize fossil fuel energy in 2011: some $100 billion for production and $523 billion for consumption. This was 20 percent higher than in 2010, largely because of higher world oil prices. Of the $523 billion that supported consumption, $285 billion went to oil, $104 billion to natural gas, and $3 billion to coal; an additional $131 billion was divided among the three energy sources specifically for electricity use. Through these subsidies, governments cut the prices people paid for fossil energy by nearly a quarter—encouraging waste and hindering efforts to stabilize climate.
Corporate Blowback
Economics, Society — by George Monbiot
Companies like EDF, seeking to terrify protesters with lawsuits, are likely to become victims of their own aggression.
Image: Todd Wiseman
Without public protest, democracy is dead. Every successful challenge to excessive power begins outside the political chamber. When protest stops, politics sclerotises: it becomes a conversation between different factions of the elite.
But protest is of no democratic value unless it is effective. It must disturb and challenge those at whom it is aimed. It must arouse and motivate those who watch. The climate change campaigners trying to prevent a new dash for gas wrote to their MPs, emailed the power companies, marched and lobbied. They were ignored. So last year 17 of them climbed the chimney of the West Burton power station and occupied it for a week(1). Theirs was a demonstration in two senses of the word: they presented an issue to the public which should be at the front of our minds. Prompted to act by altruism and empathy, one day they will be remembered as we remember suffragettes and anti-slavery campaigners.
Last week the operator of the power station – EDF, which is largely owned by the French government – announced that it is suing these people, and four others, for £5m(2). It must know that, if it wins, they have no hope of paying. It must know that they would lose everything they own, now and for the rest of their lives. For these and other reasons, EDF’s action looks to me like a Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation: a SLAPP around the ear of democracy.
Comments (1)Four Ways to Break Free and Start Designing
Land — by E. Ray Gard February 23, 2013
Photo© Craig Mackintosh
In one of the first segments of the Permaculture Design Course DVDs with Bill Mollison and Geoff Lawton, in addition to the massive amount of information, a few comments made by Mr. Lawton struck a chord with me. The nature of his comment, as I understood it, was that the PDC is intended to empower the course participants to go out and start designing at any and every scale. This one passing remark still stands out to me as transformational and applicable across every aspect of life that permaculture design can influence, which is all of them.
With that comment in mind, I set about making the following list of ways that I can break the momentum of being the spectator that modern life lets so many of us slide into without realizing it.
This is my list, but I hope it helps you along your path as well. Feel free to add or edit and please leave any more great suggestions in the comments below.
Comments (6)Fernglade Farm – Late Summer 2013 Update (Australia)
Conservation, Demonstration Sites, Food Forests, Food Plants - Annual, Food Plants - Perennial, Global Warming/Climate Change, Plant Systems, Regional Water Cycle, Rehabilitation, Soil Conservation — by Chris McLeod
It’s nearing the end of summer here at Fernglade farm and what a summer it has been. Two inches of rain in over five months, and extreme heat for days on end, results in a most unpleasant experience.
Still, despite it all, things are still growing and there is still food to eat. The kangaroos, wallabies and wombats are also still eating from the farm and they are here often enough now that I’m assuming that conditions are harder elsewhere.
As a response to the extreme weather conditions, in very early summer I set about heavily mulching all of the plants in the food forest and whilst overall about 10% of the plants and trees here have died, 90% have survived.
Comments (10)Holistic Management Training in Lismore, Northern NSW, Australia, April 2013
Courses/Workshops — by Bob Nekrasov
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Terra Sancta Permaculture and InsideOutside Management are having another Holistic Management training session in Lismore, Northern NSW. We have just finished up on our first and I can say that it’s the best training I have undertaken. For those that missed out the first time, you’re in luck.
Teaming Holistic Management with Permaculture has an exceptionally powerful effect on building soils and repairing large landscapes. But also, it’s an amazing journey of personal vision working with the Holistic scope of life systems.
We are looking for persons interested in some HM training who are located around the Northern NSW area. The training is flexible and subsidized by TAFE so incredibly cheap. This funding won’t last forever, and the course is set to start on April 3rd, so get in quick.
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