| home |
CoBiRD Systems ProposalDraft 01.1, 31st August 2004 Author: Mark Warner
The purpose of this document is to introduce potential collaborators to the CoBiRD Systems project concept, explain the rational for the project, describe the CoBiRD Systems process and outline what is required for the project to progress.
“Action of man may embellish the Earth, but it may also disfigure it .... man moulds into his image the country which he inhabits” (ref. Elisee Reclus, 1864)
The CoBiRD Systems project is an initiative to facilitate cooperative collaboration across all sectors of society in the strategic development of sustainable bioregions. It is a broad-scale permaculture approach to integrating material and cultural elements and functions through iterative design processes. There are four main aspects to CoBiRD Systems: - 1. A bioregional context and approach to dealing with issues of sustainable development, - 2. Technologies for gathering, processing and communicating information and data, - 3. Permaculture design methods and processes, and - 4. Community participation in information gathering, design and development activities.
The development of these aspects are facilitated by four components, called: BioMap, BioDesign, BioVision and Permaculture Hit-Squads. BioMap is a three dimensional (3D), virtual reality (VR), photo-realistic model of a bioregion, or a sub-region thereof, linked to databases such as Geographical Information Systems (GIS). BioDesign is computer software that can use information from the BioMap and designers, using permaculture design methods and processes to produce design options. BioVision is animation software that presents the future evolution of different design options from BioDesign based on the BioMap. Permaculture Hit-Squads are mobile teams of people equipped with the necessary skills and material to train people in permaculture design and community participative planning and development processes, initiate the generation of a local BioMap and establish the CoBiRD Systems process for community sustainable development.
The CoBiRD Systems organisation is coordinating the development of the overall CoBiRD Systems project and its constituent elements.
‘CoBiRD Systems’ stands for Community BioRegional Design Systems. ‘Co’ also stands for Coordinated, Cooperative and Collaborative. ‘R’ also stands for Regeneration and Research. ‘D’ also stands for Development.
We can define a community as any set of living organisms. The CoBiRD Systems project is community focused and considers the synergistic and value creating properties inherent in all life be deserving of respect and freed to bloom in its diversity.
Human relations with the land are intimately tied to the behavior, the cultural expressions, celebrations and, unfortunately, some foolish depravations. Both local economic and environmental development have much to offer people who are struggling within the industrial economies to secure their basic needs as well as buy all their wants to keep up a modern industrial lifestyle.
Many people are becoming increasingly aware of the potential effects of a fossil and nuclear fuel based economy through pollution issues and the ‘Greenhouse Effect’. With sea levels set to rise by over a meter in the not too distant future, many communities will be forced to move if they are not to drown on their own property. Already we see the effects of massed population migrations, people we now call ‘refugees’, but are communities of human beings uprooted from their homes and thrown onto the mercy of their neighbors. With populations rising, and land available to support contemporary economies shrinking, along with remaining biospherical controls of the forests, the future looks grim for many people, and is a living hell for people living in less fortunate parts of the world. People inevitably squabble over limited resources, the CoBiRD Systems project hopes to stimulate strengthening community bonds and facilitating positive transitions within individual communities in adaptation to dramatic changes to come through focusing on community local economic development that is in harmony with regenerating both local and global environments.
“A region being any geographical area that possesses a certain unity of climate, soil, vegetation, industry and culture. The regionalist attempts to plan such an area so that all its sites and resources, from forest to city, from highland to water level, may be soundly developed .... It sees people, industry and the land as a single entity” (ref. “The new concept of the region” from ‘Survey’ magazine - Lewis Mumford -1925)
Bioregionalism is a way of defining our living and working relationship to the land within natural boundaries. Most contemporary sociogeographical boundaries, i.e. national and local political boundaries, are arbitrarily defined. Nowhere is this more blatant than in the United States of America and Australia, where state boundaries were drawn with straight lines on maps. In Britain, although the demarcation of counties and districts were historically often related to landscape features, this was not necessarily so and in any case have often been subject to change according to political whim. However defined, these boundaries follow no consistent rationale. The situation is further complicated by overlapping areas of responsibility between local authorities and statutory authorities such as water boards, energy companies, national park authorities, etc.. This can lead to confusion as to whose responsibility lies exactly where, for instance at the boundary between two or three water boards. In terms of the health of ecosystems and hydrological management, it can be very difficult to effectively manage resources and prevent degradation of systems.
By demarcating areas of land using consistent natural definitions it is possible to begin to overcome many of the problems resulting from the above. Britain is a land blessed by reasonable amounts of rainfall, on average, but climate change is upsetting the balance to which we are accustomed. We are increasingly suffering extreme effects of flooding and drought, and the future predictions are for this trend to continue into the foreseeable future. There is therefore an imperative for us to address this problem if we are to ameliorate potentially more severe catastrophes to come. Added to this, rivers are often subject to pollution as a result of chemical spills, runoff from farms, roads and car parks, or leaks from sewers.
Water is the primary resource for life as we know it. Every organism is a bag of water containing some salts and complex organic molecules. Every organism, including human beings, is dependent on good quality water to drink or swim in. If soils do not get regular enough replenishments of water they will dry out and no longer be able to support plants and other life, without plant roots to bind them they become subject to wind erosion. Conversely, too much rain and insufficient plant cover (typical of agricultural soils) can lead to water erosion. Erosion of both types can lead to desertification and soils washed into rivers by runoff are deposited as silt, thereby exacerbating flood problems.
Management of our water resources is therefore a crucial issue. Rivers are also an important indicator of problems in the landscape from the watershed to the sea. For demarcating our bioregions we need look no further than our rivers, for each river that flows into the sea is the receiver of rainfall from a specific catchment area. This way of defining bioregions may give us some very large areas to define as a bioregion, e.g. the river Thames empties into the sea between Essex and Kent, but rises in Gloucestershire, receiving rainfall from many counties from Northamptonshire in the North to Hampshire in the South. But each of the large rivers is fed by tributary rivers, each with its own set of tributaries, and so on to the streams rising from springs and fed by rills, so each bioregion can be divided into a nested series of distinct rainfall catchment areas. The management of resources within each bioregion and sub-region can therefore be dealt with at an appropriate level of scale.
Another aspect of bioregionalism is the process whereby people develop their relationship to the landscape within which they live and work. This is a two-step process. The first step is called ‘living-in-place’, whereby a person or community comes to understand the geography, ecology, history, climate, industry, etc. of the local area, and their place within it – the types of connections and qualities of relationships. People can then learn to live in appropriate harmony with the culture and ecology of the place.
“Living-in-place means following the necessities and pleasures of life as they are uniquely presented by a particular site, and evolving ways to ensure long-term occupancy of that site. A society which practices living-in-place keeps a balance with its region of support through links between human lives, other living things, and the processes of the planet - seasons, weather, water cycles - as revealed by the place itself. It is the opposite of a society which makes a living through short-term destructive exploitation of land and life. Living-in-place is an age-old way of existence, disrupted in some parts of the world a few millennia ago by the rise of exploitative civilisation and more generally during the past two centuries by the spread of industrial civilisation. It is not, however, to be thought of as antagonistic to civilisation, in the more humane sense of that word, but may be the only way in which a truly civilized existence can be maintained.” (ref. ‘Reinhabiting a Separate Country’ - Peter Berg and Raymond Dasmann, [Planet Drum Foundation,] 1978 - Reprinted in Ecology & Freedom No.3)
The second step is called ‘reinhabitation’, which concerns taking responsibility for making further adjustments to the way the individual or community lives and works in relation to the land and each other, drawing from the understandings made through ‘living-in-place’, with a view to improving the quality of relationships and repairing damage done to the natural systems of the locality.
“Reinhabitation means learning to live-in-place in an area that has been disrupted and injured through past exploitation. It involves becoming native to a place through becoming aware of the particular ecological relationships that operate within and around it. It means understanding activities and evolving social behaviour that will enrich the life of that place, restore its life-supporting systems, and establish an ecologically and socially sustainable pattern of existence within it. Simply stated, it involves becoming fully alive in and with a place. It involves applying for membership in a biotic community and ceasing to be its exploiter.
“Reinhabitation involves developing a bioregional identity. The term bioregion refers both to geographical terrain and a terrain of consciousness - to a place and the ideas that have developed about how to live in that place. Within a bioregion the conditions that influence life are similar and these in turn have influenced human occupancy.” (ref. ‘Reinhabiting a Separate Country’ - Peter Berg and Raymond Dasmann, [Planet Drum Foundation,] 1978 - Reprinted in Ecology & Freedom No.3)
In order to do this, individuals and communities need to be empowered – freed from the fetters of authoritarian constraints and allowed to govern themselves. In the words of permaculture co-originator, Bill Mollison, “The role of beneficial authority is to return function and responsibility to life and to people; if successful, no further authority is needed. The role of successful design is to create a self managed system.” These are somewhat radical political statements, but:
“If communities are to be sustainable and autonomous, then they must be self reliant, supplying a large proportion of their own needs. This requires that the people who inhabit each bioregion do so in ways that are appropriate to its particular ecology. Technologies, agriculture and diet, shelter - in short, needs - should all be adapted to say, a stretch of coast, a range of hills, a plain, [a catchment area], or a forest.” (ref. ‘Coming Home’ - Gideon Kossoff - Ecology and Freedom No.3)
In other words, only the people who live and work in an area can appropriately plan for and develop that area. Governance from afar has thus far resulted in our current environmental and social malaise. Sustainable development is dependent on a shift in power from central government to local communities organised within a bioregional context.
We are both cosmopolitan and localist “Cultural pluralism and multilingualism are the planetary norm. We seek the balance between cosmopolitan pluralism and deep local consciousness. We are asking how the whole human race can regain self-determination in place, after centuries of being disenfranchised by hierarchy and/or centralised power. Do not confuse this exercise with ‘nationalism’ which is exactly the opposite, the impostor, the puppet of the state, the grinning ghost of the lost community.” (ref. ‘The Practice of the Wild’ - Gary Snyder - Ecology and Freedom No.3)
Another requirement of sustainable development is the rationalisation of our economic system. Rather than promoting ever increasing global trade with its concomitant environmental and social destructiveness, we need to seek ways of establishing and supporting more efficient local economies, benefiting both local communities and ecologies, and reducing congestion, resource depletion and pollution.
“How can one talk about the economics of small independent countries? How can one discuss a problem that is a non-problem? There is no such thing as the viability of people: people, actual persons like you and me, are viable when they can stand on their own feet and earn their keep. You do not make non-viable people viable by putting large numbers of them into one huge community, and you do not make viable people non-viable people by splitting a large community into a number of smaller, more intimate, more coherent and more manageable groups. All this is perfectly obvious and there is absolutely nothing to argue about.” (ref. “Small is Beautiful” - E.F. Schumacher -1973)
Regeneration is a key word for CoBiRD Systems and is used to describe the benefits gained through a strengthening economy within an increasingly biodiverse landscape. We most of us live in ecologically and hydrologically degraded landscapes. To improve biological productivity and thus the population carrying capacity of land requires efforts to reduce harmful impacts of some aspects of human activity, and promote beneficial relationships in acts of regeneration. This applies to both community and environmental regeneration.
Design relates to the conscious manipulation of information within systems and the production of plans of action for change. Permaculture design draws from ecological and cultural principles to improve the creative opportunities for increasing productivity from smaller areas of land in ways that produce no pollution and has an increasing biodiversity.
It is important to evolve and maintain coordinated landscape and resource management systems for an entire bioregion in order to achieve sustainable development. It is therefore essential to have a coherent set of tools and methodologies, and a common language with which to do it. Permaculture is the ideal design system, employing principles observed at work in nature, it is easily learned by anyone and has an ethical basis, namely:
(ref. ‘Permaculture : A Designers Manual’ - Bill Mollison)
Through the application of permaculture design we can manage the transition from our current, chaotic, uncoordinated and often destructive landuse management policies and institutional organisation to a sustainable bioregion.
In the CoBiRD Systems project, permaculture design forms the core of the BioDesign program, taking data from the BioMap and information from the designers to produce plans and schedules for implementation. These designs can then be presented as animated evolutions in 3D-VR using the BioVision program. The Pemaculture Hit-Squads provide permaculture training along with the other tools for community development and training in the use of BioMap, BioDesign and BioVision.
“You may prefer to be tending your garden, rather than spending hours in front of a box of tricks – getting sucked into a virtual reality while the real reality crumbles away. But as someone with a permaculture eye for systems, I peek into the jungle of the virtual realm that is the net and observe some of its elements and associations. If I have the inclination, I can tweak parts of this system where I feel tweaking will add value. My using permaculture design to comment on issues raised has produced some positive responses. With a few more people tweaking with permaculture we begin to garden the virtual jungle to positive effect.” (ref. ‘Permaculture Works’, ? 3003 – Mark Warner)
CoBiRD Systems is itself an evolving permaculture design. The designers’ have followed a process of protracted observation and assessment of the ‘system’, its ‘elements’ and ‘functions’, and are now processing that information within an ongoing, iterative permaculture design process. CoBiRD Systems objectives and aim are to promote health wealth and happiness within improving ecological and social environments. The ethical basis of permaculture as stated above is also the ethical basis of CoBiRD Systems.
Systems are many and varied, but every relationship and function is part of a system. Understanding systems is key to the success of bioregional communities. CoBiRD Systems uses systems thinking to encourage systems thinking. With more people able to think about the bioregional systems within which they live and work, the easier it will be for people to design their own solutions.
CoBiRD Systems is an organisation, and therefore its own community within the wider global community – a system within the solar system. The following text outlines the conceptual system that is ‘CoBiRD Systems’.
To facilitate collaboration accross all sectors of society in the strategic development of sustainable bioregions. To promote bioregional awareness and encourage the mutual consent of individuals and organisations in the appropriate development and management of the resources of their areas for the good of all. To contribute to the development of a culture of permanence in cooperation with allied organisations.
“The truly civilised man understands that his interest is bound up with that of everyone and with that of nature. He repairs the damage done by his predecessors and works to improve his domain” (ref. ‘Revue des Deux Mondes’ - Elisee Reclus, 1864)
“There must be a resorption of government into the body of the community. How? By cultivating the habit of direct action instead of waiting upon representative agencies, let cities, towns, villages, groups, associations, work out their own regional salvation: for that they must have freedom, ideas, vision to plan and means to carry out.” (ref. ‘What is to be done?’ - Patrick Geddes, 1912)
To achieve the above stated aim, the objectives of the CoBiRD Systems project are as set out below:
1. Develop the software and hardware systems to enable a 3D-VR model (BioMap) of each bioregion to be created, incorporating GIS and other databases 2. Develop permaculture design modeling software (BioDesign) that integrates with BioMap 3. Develop software that takes data from the BioMap and BioDesign programs to present 3D-VR and animated visualisations of the evolution of permaculture design options (BioVision) 4. Make the BioMap, BioDesign and BioVision programs interactively accessible via the internet 5. Make data outputs from BioMap, BioDesign and BioVision available in multi-media formats 6. Establish ‘Permaculture Hit-Squads’, to: a) Train community members in permaculture design b) Train community members in methods of information gathering, such as ‘Future Search’ and ‘Planning for Real’ c) Train people in the use of ‘BioMap’, ‘BioDesign’ and ‘BioVision’ for community sustainable development d) Build and equip teams of local people to: I. Coordinate community data gathering for input to the community’s BioMap II. Run community BioDesign and BioVision sessions III. Organise community action to implement agreed design IV. Ensure BioMap is updated and repeat steps II & III when necessary 7. Establish cross-sectoral ‘Bioregional Forum’ to coordinate activities – through common reference to the relevant BioMap and BioVision design option animations – in the management of bioregional resources for sustainable development
The CoBiRD Systems project requires the collaborative efforts of people with a wide range of skills and experience to develop its various aspects. The overall concept has to date been developed by Mark Warner, a permaculture designer and sustainable development generalist, and Tony Reid, a website developer and project manager. The overall concept is a synthesis of ideas and the CoBiRD Systems project integrates many fields of research and development being undertaken by a wide variety of individuals and organisations. Interest in the project has been expressed from many quarters and there are other potential collaborators waiting to join in with the project as it develops.
The CoBiRD approach is in harmony with the ethics and principles of permaculture design and seeks to focus on the importance of bioregional community sustainable development through participative planning processes. A look at some of the links on the CoBiRD website are will give the flavour of the sort of initiatives that integrate with the CoBiRD vision, as well as the rational for adopting a bioregioal approach to resource management and adapting to climate change.
CoBiRD is open to any offers of collaboration in sustainable development policy, design and successful application, with mutual and global benefits.
The CoBiRD Systems organisation, established by Warner and Reid in August 2004, has a website at http://www.CoBiRD.org . The role of the organisation is to coordinate the development of the CoBiRD Systems project, providing a central locus for its various elements – BioMap, BioDesign, BioVision and the Permaculture Hit-Squads. The CoBiRD organisation will undertake research into effective bioregional development at a strategic level, including education, training, facilitation, systems support and management, media and marketing, etc.
There is no funding for the CoBiRD Systems project as yet. Fundraising will begin in September 2004. Assistance in fundraising from people with appropriate skills and experience would be most appreciated.
CoBiRD Systems seeks development funding and support for developing the BioMap, BioDesign and BioVision participative community research, planning and development process tools. Joint funding for individual bioregional projects with partnership organisations within appropriate bioregions will also be sought. CoBiRD also intends to support international development in collaboration with local, regional and global organisations.
Research into innovative sustainable development investment opportunities will be undertaken. CoBiRD should have particular appeal for female investors due to their risk averse and long term approach to investment (ref. Women’s Investment Group feature, Woman’s’ Hour, Radio 4, 27/4/04.)
CoBiRD is radical in its approach to economic development, favoring stronger local economies and incorporating cashless trading systems. CoBiRD Systems offers a ‘portfolio of opportunities’ for the greening of capitalism, bringing it in line the wider world movement for sustainable development. CoBiRD is supportive of such initiatives as the Fair Trade Foundation’s support for small farmers in developing countries and collaboration with the Soil Association in promoting and supporting organic practices within a global market. Globalisation in CoBiRD terms is a flourishing of vibrant communities with strong local economies within improving ecologies. Investment for international joint-funding partnership projects for ‘Integrated Sustainable Futures’ Initiatives’ will also be sought.
An element within permaculture design is the principle of ‘rolling permaculture’, where a small, highly productive area is established in order to generate the raw material to establish further areas, and so on. In the same way, a CoBiRD Systems pilot project can be established, its systems tested and improved until operational certainty is proven. The project workers receive training and gain experience on the pilot project. They can then move on to another area as a ‘Permaculture (Pc) Hit-Squad’ to begin a new project and train up a new ‘Pc Hit-Squad’. Once this next project is established, two trained ‘Pc Hit-Squads’ move on to two more areas. By replicating in this way, the CoBiRD Systems project can proliferate by exponential growth.
A business plan for the development of the CoBiRD Systems organisation will be developed in 2004/5. |