Permaculture

I’m enrolled in the Global Sustainability Master Program at the University of South Florida. Since I currently live and work in North Florida I attend all my classes online. While facing some challenges in completing an assignment last week I decided to take a quick impromptu trip to Tampa, FL to gain some clarification from my professor and take advantage of the long trip to also enjoy a live lecture. And WOW what a great experience that was! It was so refreshing being back on a university campus and interacting with like-minded individuals and seeing how other students are so passionate about sustainability issues. 

The topic of the week and the live lecture was PERMACULTURE; aka: permanent agriculture.  

Permaculture is a system of agricultural designs and principles that works with the environment - any environment - to generate positive yields for people and for the ecosystem. Permaculture  refutes traditional mono cropping farming methodologies and practices that are currently widespread around the USA and many parts of the world and the incredibly mis-conception that mass production mono-cropping is the most efficient and effective way of ensuring food security. 

Permaculture systems adheres to the idea that all forms of lives - including future lives - matter. It promotes the scaling of polycropping to fit any type of environment and the needs of the end user while fully incorporating and respecting the preservation of the ecosystem in which it operates and of our planet.

     

        It works EVERYWHERE:  

While traditional farming asks: “What can I get from this land?  Permaculture practitioners ask: “What does this land have to give if I cooperate with it?” Traditional agricultural practices in the USA have been the cause of many negative environmental impacts such as deforestation, soil degradation, pollution and waste just to name a few, and permaculture offers solutions to these current problems.  

The Ethical Basis of Permaculture, as described by Bill Mollison, are as follows: 

1.Care for the Earth

- Provision for all life systems to continue and multiply 

2.Care of People

- Provision for people to access those resources necessary to their existence

3.Setting limits to population and consumption

-By governing our own needs, we can set resources aside to further the above principles

This may sound rather selfish - since I am a meat lover - but one of my favorite concepts within permaculture is  that it discourages the idea that “we should all become vegetarians, or herbivores….to ameliorate the world food shortage problems” (Millison, 1988). Permaculture promotes the concept of eating locally and seasonally, and the notion that we should be cautious as to blindly eliminate any type of life element from our diets without considering our local environment. 

When in Peru, eat as Peruvians do: 

This is not to say that vegetarian or vegan life-styles are detrimental or do not help fight against climate change or assist with water conservation efforts in any way. I believe it does help, but only if it supports the ecosystem and/or environment where such diet is performed. 

I recently moved to a southern rural area of the United States where many hunt for the protein they put on their dinner plates - mostly deer. Deers are actually considered the top three most dangerous animal in the United States due to the amount of vehicle collision accidents it is responsible for yearly. During mating season deers are present everywhere in this part of the country and car collisions with this animal are so common that residents of the area usually keep a number stored in their mobile phones of someone who hauls off deer from the roads when a collision happens (instead of a toll truck driver they call the ‘deer hauler’). Now can you imagine if everyone in this area became a vegetarian? Would they really be doing the planet any favors? “Eating where we live” may be a better option is regards to sustainable diets. 

   Just a bit of humor... Please don't take it too seriously... 

While discussing my current visit to my college campus with a family member and the current weekly topics in my food, water and energy nexus thinking class my relative stated that she had never heard of such practice. At which point it hit me that many are still unaware of permaculture practices and of its many benefits.  

Permaculture is not a threat - or a hipster revolution - it is a very viable solution to current and future food security challenges we face, So why haven’t more people heard of it? There is some sustainable food for thought - pun intended! 

“The only ethical decision is to take responsibility for our own existence” 

Please view the film INHABIT to learn more about Permaculture:
https://archive.org/details/InhabitAPermaculturePerspective#