Permaculture

As originally conceived, permaculture – short for ‘permanent agriculture’ – is a revolutionary form of agriculture, intended to replace the methods of cultivation introduced thousands of years ago with the advent of urban civilisation, and not essentially changed since then. Bill Mollison, who coined the term, observed that agriculture has lacked design, having generally involved a crude process of clearing the wilderness and establishing a cycle of digging or ploughing, then seeding with a few useful species, primarily grasses, then harvesting the crop to feed humans and livestock – and the cycle begins again year on year until the land is exhausted – after which a new area of wilderness is cleared. Mollison proposed introducing design into agriculture with a view to making it sustainable and high-yielding so that human communities could have their needs met on the least possible land area, in order to preserve the little remaining wilderness worldwide for other species, and release land for natural ecosystems to be re-established. This would also result in extensive areas of prolific vegetative growth capable of acting as a carbon sink and to stabilise climate regionally and globally.

In order to implement this global vision, we need locally specific designs, because every place on earth is different in local climate, land form, soils, and the combinations of species which will thrive. Not only does the land and its potential vary from place to place, but so do people vary in their needs and preferences and their capacities. Hence at the local level, permaculture designers often refer to permaculture as being about designing for ‘permanent culture’, and encompassing housing, water systems, transport and so on, and also invisible structures such as legal and financial systems, and the development of supportive social networks.

Land Degradation

‘Civilised man has marched across the face of the earth and left a desert in his footprints’ (Anon, quoted in Carter and Dale, 1974)

‘By active use of fire … humans changed to an “ecologically dominant” species … as long ago as 1,500,000 years.’ (Goudsblom, 1992)

The UNEP estimates that the productive capacity of about a quarter of all usable land has already been reduced, some severely. Land has been degraded by agricultural mismanagement (550m ha), overgrazing (680m ha), deforestation (580m ha), unsustainable fuelwood consumption (140m ha), and by industry and urbanisation (20m ha). Even these alarming figures probably don’t take account of the impoverished state of soils subjected to industrialised farming practices worldwide.

In addition, climate change will become a serious problem in the next 100 years. Land degradation leads to a release of carbon through oxidation of soil organic matter, contributing to increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, which makes matters worse. This process could be reversed: land reclamation and improved agricultural practices including agroforestry could increase the carbon stored in soils by 30 to 50 tonnes/ha. This would provide a double benefit: improving the future security of food supplies and reducing greenhouse gases.

Is Permaculture the Solution?: Workshop Questions

1. What does permaculture have to offer?
   
   
2. Does permaculture have the potential to bring about a revolution in land use?

   NB: There’s no point in having a ‘permaculture pressure group’. Transnationals and national governments have strong vested interests in maintaining the current damaging practices – they are part of the problem. Widespread improvements in land use will need to be preceded by significant shifts in culture and attitude, to heal our current alienation from the land. Ordinary people need to change things ourselves. So ….

3. How could permaculture be made attractive to ordinary (mainstream) people currently living secure lives in suburbs and towns in Britain?

Chris Marsh

Please contact me with comments, suggestions, contributions:
chris@des4rev.org.uk

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