Permaculture principle #4: Apply self-regulation and accept feedback
A powerful principle: simple in its workings, so difficult to fully engage with! The truth is, I have found this principle the toughest one to reflect on so far! Why might that be? Well, partly I think because I have been witnessing how growing positive feedbacks of climate change and biodiversity erosion seem to be […]
Permaculture principle #3: Obtain a yield
It is the whole system that yields, not just a series of parts On a Permaculture farm, plants, shrubs, trees, and animals are chosen and organised so that each of them will provide several beneficial inputs to other parts of the overall system (according to the famous permaculture design principle: 1 element = several functions; […]
Permaculture principle #2: Capture and store energy
Increasing the potency of biological fields Permaculture suggests that reliance on cheap oil has shifted our systems’ capacity for resilience and self-reliance. We need to reclaim and implement our capacity to harness, store and circulate energy, and use it with a much higher degree of efficiency than we have accepted so far, under the illusion […]
Permaculture principle #1: Observe and interact
Taking Nature in The first step for a permaculturist when arriving on a new piece of land, or in a new farming community, is to slow right down, and to hold back any urge for quick ‘productive’ action. My friend Rob (https://www.robhopkins.net/ ) even suggests that where you decide to settle, build a house and […]
Permaculture, Organisations and Management – Introduction
Consider this Earth as a 3,8 billion-year old R&D lab; for all this time, over 20 millions species have evolved in co-existence, spinning through their interactions, and interconnections, a web of Life that in return creates the “conditions conducive for more life” (Janine Benyus), in an ever growing yet self-regulating fertile and virtuous cycle. […]
Calm after the storm
In Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony, the fifth movement is called “Joyful and grateful feelings after the storm”. It tells how life returns to nature after a violent storm. That’s exactly what I felt a few weeks ago on the board of directors of an association where I’ve been a volunteer for several years. You can start […]
