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Permaculture Samoa – Part II

by Tamlyn Magee (Tamlyn is living and working in Samoa on a Permaculture education and demonstration project with local NGO, METI). For Part I, click here.

This month has been a month of before photos. The extended hard work of many people (and pigs) is paying off, as we watch the Demonstration Farm and Permaculture/Life Skills Course come into being. The building of our own knowledge, skills and relationships are all also converging, to give us a glimpse of the potential of our system to be productive and fulfilling as it evolves. Obstacles are plentiful, positivity more so!

Permaculture found its way on to the Samoan Islands by the wisdom and perseverance of an extremely motivated couple – Walter (Executive Director) and Matatumua Vermuelen (Project Coordinator). It has gained momentum by the strength of METI staff who fearlessly support a logical and ethical basis for development, in the face of all skepticism. We continue to endeavor to share knowledge and resources with our 16 (and growing) village farming co-operatives. We are training Life Skills Coaches in preparation for their roles as Permaculture promoters in their villages. And now, the time is rapidly approaching to really ‘walk the talk’ – and turn these states of before into something functional and inspiring.


Measuring a tropical compost pile using our arms and our noses


…and here is some we prepared earlier


Pua’a do a sensational job of preparing land for the first veggie garden. We started
with 3 little ones in a 12x15m area; unfortunately one has left us, but the other two are
growing fast! It is a relatively slow process with only 2 pigs, but I was pleasantly
surprised by their work ethic. (The leguminous gatai to the left are also
performing well here.)

A group planning session was undertaken to design the first Vailele veggie garden, the main objectives of which are to: a) feed staff and students, and b) provide a primary example of permaculture principles for the upcoming courses. The team came up with exciting ideas, including using an existing pile of rocks and rubble to form a productive raised area for drier crops and as an aesthetic entryway where observers can look down on the whole garden; a banana circle placed at the lowest point to infiltrate run-off and as an on-site waste disposal/mulch and compost source; and the incorporation of a large diversity of flowering species to please the bees placed just east of the garden site (and to please me!). A pond system is under negotiation.


A rough sketch of the preliminary design we came up with

 


The mushroom-growing tyre-shed before the bamboo/thatch roof has been built

 


… and a bamboo clump before and after thinning – the poles removed to be
used as the roofing and as propagation material for the huge bamboo project
METI is also involved in (just under 7,500 branch cuttings of various clumping
species have just been planted to supply co-ops with bamboo, intended to reforest
and stabilise cleared areas around the Fuluaso catchment while providing
building/fencing/weaving material and food for farming families – among
the many other uses for bamboo, of which I’m sure Samoans will find more.)

 


The boys recycle some material from the old pig housing to build nursery tables.

(Two days later the first seedlings have poked their heads out already!
Three days later and the beans are up!)

 


Fiau’u Tumamao and I hold the two versions (English and Samoan) of the
(draft) Permaculture Introduction Course Booklet, awaiting completion of an
accompanying Teachers’ Manual along with lesson plans for each module.
Fiau’u, Education Officer and invaluable staff member of METI, will be the
main teacher of the Permaculture and Life Skills courses.

The course aims to provide local farmers with an introductory understanding and experience of Permaculture systems. It will be largely hands-on, utilising the developing Vailele Site to demonstrate Permaculture principles/theory and to teach some specific techniques such as making compost and compost tea, designing and building vegetable gardens, doing vermiculture, etc. We will show the results of simple practices like using mulch, and make clear the implications of using chemicals, while providing alternatives to deal with African snail infestations, for example. (Yes, there is a duck deficiency in Samoa.) Since health and nutrition are grey areas in terms of awareness in Samoa, the course will also focus on promoting the value of traditional foods and medicines (grown onsite or locally). The Life Skills component teams up with Permaculture to demonstrate the importance of healthy communities, and encourage creative thought and self-reliance within those communities.

The structure of this project is unique because it incorporates the creation of support networks after the course is taken. As I write this post 20 or so Life Skills graduates are taking a course in Adult Education and Training at the National University of Samoa. Upon completion of this and some further Life Skills training, they will become Life Skills Coaches themselves, based in their own villages. These Life Skills Coaches will also undertake the Permaculture training, and then send a group (of about 20-25) farmers from their villages to take the Permaculture course also. You can imagine, I’m sure, that with 23 farmers and a prominent Life Skills Coach all on board, fresh from a 3-week course, heading back to their village at the same time (buzzing from an organic, nutritious diet and creative stimulation), the generation of continued excitement, new ideas and sustainable systems in each participating village would be hard to avoid.


Finally, the student house, hidden amongst tamaligis, mangoes and lemons,
waiting to be restored and to become the accomodation for students on the
fast-approaching 3-week courses. What you can’t see here is the 6-star open
ocean views, from our vantage point high on a coastal cliff, and the idyllic
possibilities for mixed herb and flower gardens adjoined to the warm,
breezy verandah.

I can’t wait to show you the after shots of this place!

6 Comments

  1. I hope you and your village are OK after the recent Tsunami. Please make a post so we can stop worrying… And then get back to rebuilding all that wonderful work you’ve accomplished!

  2. Hi Guys, thanks for your concern. Tamlyn was travelling from Samoa to NZ when it hit, so she is safe. No doubt we’ll hear from her soon enough to learn of the outcome for the project site and other people involved, etc.

  3. Hi everyone,
    Apologies that a response and posted article was not the first thing I got to after returning to the island. For various reasons, some obvious, some not, it was a very hard topic to write about. Thankyou for your concern – and I didn’t make clear in the article that Apia (where the PC project is based) was not physically affected and the gardens and animals are doing fine.

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