Gaiacraft Workbook: Global Release
Courses/Workshops, DVDs/Books — by Delvin Solkinson February 3, 2012
As an offering to the planetary permaculture movement we have created a workbook of permaculture worksheets. This educational tool kit will help support your learning and teaching practice.
In the spirit of a genuine love for permaculture education and in gratitude to the world community, this new learning tool is intended to help heal and empower our relationship with ourselves, the Earth and each other. The Gaiacraft Permaculture Workbook shares a collection of universal handouts which string together a larger body of teachings from Bill Mollison, Rosemary Morrow, Geoff Lawton, David Holmgren and Toby Hemenway. It’s edited in collaboration by the Gaiacraft team; Delvin Solkinson, Lunaya Shekinah, Jacob Aman, Tamara Griffiths and Ali Ma. This is a unique and practical addition to your understanding and practice of permaculture.
Comments (4)Extended Permaculture Design Course in the Negev
Aid Projects, Courses/Workshops — by Alice Gray February 2, 2012
What: Extended Permaculture Design Course
When: The itinerary is based on weeks of 5 days where the weekends are free for advancing individual projects, rest or travel in Israel. Program starts on the 11th of March and ends on 15th of August 2012.
Where: The course and accommodations will take place at the Eco khan of Qasr A-Sir, a Bedouin village next to Dimona, Israel.
Vision for Bustan course:
This is going to be a very special permaculture course, that goes way beyond the remit of the normal 2 week intensive Permaculture Design Certificate. In the course of their 5 month stay in Qasr A-Sir, the participants will live and breathe permaculture; have time to absorb, process and discuss the information they are receiving; delve into the historic cultural journey of the human race; see examples of how ancient cultures dealt with their environmental problems and engage in the struggle of contemporary people to deal with theirs; and eventually actually design and implement some permaculture projects, leaving behind a legacy of enhanced sustainability and access to resources that will improve peoples’ quality of life in the host community, and gaining practical experience and know-how that they can take with them when they leave. This will not be just any course – this will be a life-changing experience.
Comments (0)A PDC as a Journey
Courses/Workshops, Society — by Jon Foote February 1, 2012
When a PDC turns from a certificate course into a journey of change.
When I first registered for my PDC there was a sense of excitement in what I would potentially learn and the new skills I would gain and be able to apply. As time got closer, the focus then turned to the final details of getting there and getting home afterwards. For me the trip there consisted of:
Comments (4)Holistic Management Training in Northern NSW
Courses/Workshops, Livestock, Rehabilitation, Soil Conservation, Structure — by Bob Nekrasov January 25, 2012
What better way to become more of a danger to the modern realm of earth destruction and technological torment than to team up Permaculture knowledge with Holistic Management training.
Teaming HM with Permaculture has an exceptionally powerful effect on building soils, repairing large landscapes and assisting with an holistic framework of decision making. A perfect tool to add to a PDC making you a true humus-building rebel.
Comments (5)Call for Volunteers – Regional Permaculture Conference and Convergence in Turkey
Conferences, Courses/Workshops, Project Positions, Social Gatherings — by Dijan Albayrak
The Permaculture Research Institute Turkey is planning to host three prominent events in summer 2012. First a Permaculture Design Certificate (PDC) course will be organized in Istanbul on 30 June — 12 July, 2012; held by two legendary trainers, Bill Mollison and Geoff Lawton. Following the PDC, a Regional Permaculture Conference will take place in Istanbul on the 14th of July. Last but not least the PIT would like to welcome you at its field practice venue; Marmariç village in Izmir, for the Regional Permaculture Convergence – the Mediterranean, Balkans Caucasus and Middle East.
This open call aims to inform you about these events and to form an international prep team for the preparations.
Below, further explanations are provided about the events. We wanted to reach out to a group of existing contacts of the institute, in order to ask for your support. We look for volunteers who would like to join our International Prep Team (IPT).
Comments (1)Michael Reynolds, Earthship Originator, Speaking in Sydney
Building, Courses/Workshops — by Milkwood Permaculture January 24, 2012
Guess what? Milkwood are hosting a great evening talk with Michael Reynolds, that world-leading sustainability pioneer of Earthship Biotecture, in Sydney on the 26th Feb. Do you want to come?
Comments (1)Food Security and Seed Saving
Courses/Workshops, Seeds — by Kay Baxter January 23, 2012
5-Day Workshop with Kay Baxter (from NZ’s Koanga Institute) at the PRI’s Zaytuna Farm, NSW, Australia
In our changing and unstable world, the question of food security is becoming increasingly relevant. Our ability to grow healthy food locally and sustainably is dependent in many ways on the quality of our seeds. It has been a focus of the Koanga Institute for many years to support home gardeners with the skills needed for self reliance, and understanding the process of saving high quality seed that is well adapted to local climates is fundamental to this. Almost all seed available commercially today is grown by large companies either in Europe or the USA. This leaves the home gardener extremely vulnerable to global instability if they are not saving their own seeds. Genetic diversity in our food crops has been lost on a drastic scale due to the industrialisation of our food production. The incredible diversity we once had, with thousands of genetically unique varieties, has been reduced to a tiny number of varieties that have been selected for their suitability to commercial applications (not the requirements of a home gardener).
What’s Happening at PRI Australia in 2012?
Courses/Workshops — by Bonnie Freibergs
Sunset at Zaytuna Farm
Photo © Craig Mackintosh
At the Permaculture Research Institute (PRI) we have locked in our courses for 2012. We are running five Permaculture Design Certificate (PDC) courses, three 10-week Internships and a multitude of short courses and workshops. We have kicked off the year with a 72-hour PDC on January the 8th which is now being followed by our highly sought after Internship program on January the 23rd. The rest of the year is packed full of courses back to back. Not only do you have the opportunity to be taught by world renowned educators, Geoff and Nadia Lawton, and their facilitators, Tim Barker and Bryon Joel, but we have lined up guest teachers; Warren Brush, Paul Taylor, Nick Huggins, Kay Baxter, Bob Corker and our legendary chef Ish. For your convenience I have listed these courses with dates and links to more information on each.
Comments (0)Permaculture in Damaged Lands: Degradation and Restoration in New Mexico
Community Projects, Conservation, Courses/Workshops, Deforestation, Demonstration Sites, Eco-Villages, Education Centres, Energy Systems, Gabions, Irrigation, Land, People Systems, Processing & Food Preservation, Regional Water Cycle, Rehabilitation, Society, Soil Conservation, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Storm Water, Swales, Village Development, Waste Water, Water Contaminaton & Loss, Water Harvesting — by Dan Smith January 21, 2012
A certain coal-strewn road in Madrid, New Mexico
— the remnants of a now defunct railway.
Alternately barren and spectacular, the southwest United States has piqued the imagination of Americans and people across the world for generations. The site of gold rushes, Native American homelands, and a culture of lawlessness that has yet to fade completely, much of the land was degraded and destroyed long before Hollywood discovered how to cash in on retelling stories from its checkered past. Films may glorify the breadth and scope of the iconic terrain, but the essence and character of the Southwest ecology has been drastically altered; it little resembles what it once was.
Comments (6)Gold Coast Permaculture Prepares for Another Great Year Ahead
Community Projects, Courses/Workshops, Demonstration Sites, Developments, Land, Rehabilitation, Soil Biology, Urban Projects, Village Development — by Permaculture Gold Coast January 19, 2012
by Vanessa Fernandes
Dani, Mel, Judy, Kristy and Pond in the house garden
2011 has been seminal in the development of permaculture on the Gold Coast, NSW, Australia. The incorporation of Gold Coast Permaculture (GCP) early in the year has seen the organisation and the concept become very much integrated into the Gold Coast community sector. Some of the sector we have cooperation with are:
- Employment Plus, the employment arm of the Salvation Army
- The Smith Family provides contact with schools and organisations that wish to create gardens
- The Department of Corrective Services
- Federation House who are working with individuals who have become very marginalised
- We work with local government and other not-for-profit groups.
We are also blessed to have many individual volunteers who have embraced the project.
Comments (3)Pre Permaculture Urban Permaculture Landscape Design Course Practicum
Courses/Workshops — by Nick Huggins January 18, 2012
Open to 10 persons (only) with PDC in hand that are keen to learn & assist in the design and planning of a kitchen garden, main-crop and animal system design for a young family in the beautiful town of Bangalow, Northern NSW, Australia, as a preamble to the Permaculture Urban Landscape Design course starting the following day. Click on the link here to book for the Urban Permaculture Landscape Design Course running from 13th February 2012.
Come and get hands on design, client interaction and design delivery experience in a tight time frame of 7 hours — or 77 person hours including me — in the process of site assessment, set out of earthworks and garden design and development.
Comments (0)A Step and a Stride: From Academia to Abundance
Aid Projects, Community Projects, Courses/Workshops — by Graham Calder January 17, 2012
How exactly did I get here? When did I embark on this journey of abundance? Here I am looking back on my life, and seeing how it all started….
Raised on 75 acres of subsistence farm I was an unlikely candidate to moving to the big city of Montreal at age 20. After five years studying the discouraging field of Environmental Science and Human Environment, I found myself at a loss for solutions. Academia only paralyzed me in face of environmental challenges, and with my employment with Environment Canada preaching contorted, underwhelming solutions and finger wagging, it was all taking its toll. My studies and career where failing me greatly.
Comments (6)Permaculture Urban Landscape Design Course
Courses/Workshops, Urban Projects — by Craig Mackintosh PRI Editor January 16, 2012
Photo © Craig Mackintosh
I’d love to take this course myself, but alas, I’m unable to make it. Those of you who’re itching to get started, or to do better, with your urban patch (or with someone else’s urban patch!), should seriously consider jumping on this course.
During this intensive 5-day Permaculture Urban Landscape Design course, students will learn the fundamentals of running a professional permaculture design and consultancy business. This is a hands-on learning experience, from the ground up. You will be able to manage contractor bidding and installation of the design on behalf of the client, able to produce concepts and plans for urban, rural and aid projects, learn about proper selection of plants, softscaping, hardscaping, costing and estimation, and have the opportunity to learn the fundamentals of design, implementation and execution in several real life environments.
The course will be run at the PRI’s Zaytuna Farm, under the expert hands of Nick Huggins. See Nick’s author profile here, and his WPN profile here.
Comments (2)Greeks Reclaim the Land to Ease the Pain of Economic Austerity
Aid Projects, Community Projects, Compost, Consumerism, Courses/Workshops, Economics, Food Shortages, Fungi, Rehabilitation, Salination, Society, Soil Biology, Soil Composition, Soil Conservation, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Village Development, Water Contaminaton & Loss — by Beatrice Yannacopoulou January 13, 2012
Editor’s Note: The recently-formed PRI Hellas (Greece) team are making good progress in difficult times, as evidenced by this nice piece from The Ecologist below. If you want to support this work, whilst having a great learning experience in an incredibly beautiful location, be sure to check out their April 23 – 29, 2012, Intensive 6-day Permaculture Seminar & Workshop on the island of Kefalonia, Greece.
A group of community-minded gardeners have turned a former Athens airport into a blooming vegetable plot, showing how Greece’s eroded soil holds the keys to a revival in farming and a way to buck the jobless trend.
by Beatrice Yannacopoulou. Article originally published on The Ecologist
All photographs courtesy: Dimitris.V.Geronikos
"If we want to survive on this land we must first help to heal the earth," said Nicolas Netién, agro-ecologist, teacher and co-creator of the NGO Permaculture Research Institute Hellas. He was talking to a group of some fifty people of all ages who had gathered for two days of workshops on self-sufficiency, how to self-organize, agro-ecology and composting. This small gathering was taking place on a beautifully sunny autumn day at the former Athens airport, Ellinikon.
Comments (3)Permaculture and Philosophy
Courses/Workshops, Education, Society, Village Development — by Angelo Eliades January 11, 2012
We can teach philosophy by teaching gardening, but we cannot teach gardening by teaching philosophy. – Bill Mollison
The place of philosophy in Permaculture has always been a contentious subject and for very good reasons. The very identity and credibility of the design system of permaculture rests on its sound scientific underpinnings and foundations.
Through the definition of strict boundaries of what can and cannot be added to the body of the permaculture syllabus, it has managed to retain its intended focus, and therefore its effectiveness as a scientific design discipline.
If the relationship and connection of permaculture to philosophy is not clearly understood, we run the very real risk of destroying the integrity of the discipline of permaculture, by making inappropriate additions in the misguided endeavour to ‘make it all things to all people’.
So, the best way to tackle any contention about this subject is to examine the nature of permaculture itself as well as the nature of what we loosely define as philosophy, and the relationship between them. And that’s precisely what we’ll do!
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