Permaculture is not, as spell check might suggest, a
movement dedicated to the art of curling one’s hair. It’s a way of looking to
nature to inspire change across all areas of our lives.
The term permaculture originated as a portmanteau of
‘permanent agriculture’, but it’s become more than that; a set of principles
for a change in culture and communities.
“One of the
best definitions of permaculture is ‘Common sense made common again’,”
explained Social Landscapes’ Tish Vail. “If you go back to indigenous
knowledge, people just did stuff because it made sense yet for some reason,
we’ve lost the ability to make it really simple.”
What are the practices of permaculture?
It emerged in
the 1970s when University of Tasmania lecturer Bill Mollison and student David
Holmgren began looking into our unsustainable structures for growing food and
developed a methodology, drawing inspiration from diversity in nature.
For
example: we grow big fields of one crop. If that one crop becomes diseased or
eaten by pests, the whole food supply has been wiped out. Whereas in
a forest the species are so diverse that if one dies, there would still be a
huge number of others to supply food.
They used
nature herself as inspiration to develop the three strands that exist in
permaculture today.
First: looking
into ecology - observing how systems in nature work - then extracting those
principles and applying them to a design.
Second:
researching and putting into action the knowledge and practices of indigenous
people. Working with the environment, not fighting it.
Lastly,
looking at systems-theory and exploring relationships between things in a
system; how behavioural patterns emerge.
Overarching
these three strands are three ethics of permaculture:
People care
(“How can this be beneficial to people?”)
Earth care
(“How does this affect the environment and how do I make it beneficial for
it?”)
Fair share
(“Can I put this back into the system again or give it to a new system?”)
According to Tish, a lot of permaculture is about using the
problem to create the solution.
She said: “If you have slugs on your veggie patch, what’s
the alternative solution to putting chemicals down? Ask yourself what’s in your
eco system that could help.
"Oh look, I have a pond with ducks so I’ll create a
space that allows the ducks through the vegetable patch to eat the slugs.
“You’re feeding the ducks, getting rid of the slugs and the
ducks can help fertilise the ground with their poo. Natural solutions.”
Similarly, Tish suggested that you can grow your own
vegetables even on a small balcony by looking at the layering of plants in
nature.
Instead of having flat-laying boxes, find a way to stack
them on top of each other, as you might find in a forest, and create a food
growing wall.
How can permaculture help our community?
Social
Landscapes work with councils, particularly Lambeth, and communities to bring
people together in what they call a “beneficial project”, as well as offering
private workshops.
For instance, you may have seen the big “Edible Wellfield
Road” planter pots of free-to-take vegetables, built and cared for by its
residents as part of an engagement project in 2014.
“Within
communities we've become very separated,” Tish said. “What we do is to try and use the garden spaces or outdoor spaces to bring communities and people back
together.
“What we’ve
found is that food is an essential part of our living and when you help people
see they can grow their own food, you see these connections.
“When
people see they have a beneficial output, whatever it may be; berries, apples,
vegetables, there’s a delight in that and from our experience that’s where
we’ve found that this sense of beneficial relationships is starting to bring
people back together again.”
Approached
by Lambeth Council directly, they’re currently working on a project for Roupell
Park Estate in Streatham Hill.
Tish said:
“There's a derelict piece of land just outside that's been empty for about 7
years; the council want us to turn it into a community space.
“We've had
four community consultations to find out what residents want for the space, how
they see it working, what they need.
“Lots of
great ideas came out, all based on permaculture principles and us asking ‘how
do we keep the system going once we’ve left them to it?’”
Social
Landscapes also worked on a cycle tour around Lambeth, using permaculture
principles to create a pathway for people to see the great projects going on in
the borough.
How can permaculture save our planet?
Tish thinks
we should be looking to permaculture as part of the worldwide discussion about
our environment.
“Experts
are now saying the impact we’re having on our planet has reached irreversible
levels and if we don’t stop it’s going to be absolutely disastrous for us,” she
said. “Not in a different generation but in 10, 20 years. In our lifetime.
“A lot of
the environmental issues we’ve got feel like they’re too big and global and the
individual can’t make those changes. It feels defeating.
“What
permaculture does is give you a way to make small, manageable, changes.
“If
everybody started making these small changes the collective can have a big
impact rather than people thinking they need to change the world.
“It’s an
activist movement but in a positive way.
“You can
just quietly get on with it – you don’t have to make a big statement and it
makes you feel good – you always get a benefit from it.
“Once you
start doing it, it encourages you to make more changes.”
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