A Request to Webmasters – Change Links to PermacultureNews.org
General — by Craig Mackintosh PRI Editor September 1, 2012
You haven’t been seeing so many posts of late, as I’ve been a little distracted, getting under the hood of this website to fix a few things.
Given the very international scope of our work, one of items I’ve checked off the things-to-do list is to switch our domain from permaculture.org.au over to www.permaculturenews.org.
Important: To help search engines recognise and index us properly, I’d be immensely grateful if the webmasters who are linking to us would be so kind as to edit those links, changing the web address to our new one: www.permaculturenews.org
When you do so, please remove mention of ‘Australia’ — i.e. change ‘Permaculture Research Institute of Australia’ to ‘The Permaculture Research Institute’.
And if you’re not linking to our site, why not do so? The more people can find us, the more we can network and support each other, the more knowledge and resources we can share, and the more projects we can see getting established!
Thanks to you all for all you’re doing in the world.
Comments (9)Please Help a Permaculturist in Trouble – Update
General — by Bonnie Freibergs August 21, 2012
Tiny Eglington, who has been hospitalised in the Riverside Medical Centre, in Bacolod, in the Philippines for an infection is his leg, is now conscious and out of the Intensive Care Unit. Three days after Geoff’s post, PRI had raised $2174.01 which was sent to Tiny. This was enough funds for him to buy blood and have a small operation on his leg — and the good news is that they will not have to amputate. Since the 13th of August PRI has raise another $645.31, which will be sent along with any other funds to Tiny on Friday the 24th of August.
Permaculture, Nature & Civilization
General — by Oyvind Holmstad August 10, 2012
Workers of the industrial revolution
Permaculture was first a contraction of the words permanent agriculture, later being widened to include all permanent culture. The problem is, however, that culture is seen as opposed to nature, its contradiction. Ross Wolf writes:
The concept usually opposed to “culture” is “nature,” as structuralist anthropology taught us long ago. Permaculture could thus be seen to signify a state of permanent unnature. – Ross Wolf
I guess you are all a little shocked now. Does permaculture really mean a state of permanent unnature? I don’t think this was the intention of our founding father, Bill Mollison. Do we have to build a new brand?
Comments (7)Please Help a Permaculturist in Trouble
General — by Geoff Lawton
Tiny Eglington, an old friend of mine from a farming background and now long-time permaculture practitioner and teacher, is currently in the Philippines where he had been visiting organic farms there. Tiny has been a big part of pushing organic farming in this region.
Unfortunately Tiny is now in hospital with serious health problems. He got an infection in his leg and with his diabetes and age it affected his kidneys.
Comments (13)The Australian National Food Plan – Have Your Say!
Biodiversity, Consumerism, Deforestation, Economics, GMOs, General, Global Warming/Climate Change, Health & Disease, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Water Contaminaton & Loss, peak oil — by Craig Mackintosh PRI Editor July 24, 2012
 National Food Plan, Green Paper 3.75mb PDF |
The Australian federal government has issued a green paper on a National Food Plan for public consultation, which will include a series of public meetings in various places over the next several weeks, until September 30, 2012.
This is an excellent opportunity for permaculturists, localvores, agro-ecologists, etc., to get their message across and help ensure that it’s not just the big corporations who shape Australia’s food future (to their own disastrous ends).
Inset, at right, is the full Green Paper, and here is a summary. You’ll see that the focus is on dollars and exports, rather than sustainable peak-oil-generation resilience.
There are several ways you can give input on this topic. Find our more here, and register for a meeting near you here.
Please share this page, and encourage as many lucid souls as you can to get involved and breathe some sanity into Australia’s food future.
Comments (6)“And Why Are You Doing This ‘Permaculture’ Thing?”
Consumerism, General, Society — by Juan Pablo Martinez July 21, 2012
Over the weekend, my wife and I were discussing my last article (Permaculture, a Step by Step Change), and someone asked: And why are you doing this Permaculture thing? The answer somehow is quite difficult to address, but one has to have his thoughts and motivations clear in order to respond in a way that may inspire others to follow the path.
Comments (11)It’s Time to Re-Ruralise
Consumerism, Eco-Villages, Economics, Education, General, Society, Village Development, peak oil — by Craig Mackintosh PRI Editor July 20, 2012
We’ve mentioned the re-ruralisation movement happening in debt-ridden Greece before, and here’s a video by German TV on the topic.
For decades people, worldwide, have been flowing from the countryside in to the cities.
Comments (9)Permaculture, a Step by Step Change
Consumerism, General, Society — by Juan Pablo Martinez July 13, 2012
To me, the simple idea of changing from an energy guzzling, water polluting, fertilizer junkie to a full ecological ‘Permie’ was just bogus. So far, it has proven impossible to make the full change in the last three years.
I want to share with you some of my thoughts, ideas and frustrations; maybe you’ll find them familiar. What I have found is that my most important asset is my will. I am sure you have it to. Without it you will be disappointed after the first setback or caustic comment from someone you care about.
Comments (15)Foodscaping: Reap What You Sow
Courses/Workshops, General, Society — by Matthew Lynch June 11, 2012
I thought you might be interested in this short news segment which recently aired nationally on the ‘America Now’ news network in the USA, featuring yours truly:
Check out the lengthy disclaimer given by the TV hosts at the end of the segment (morbidly fascinating), though I especially like the permaculture plugs given by the reporter "look up your local permaculturist in the White Pages" and "or with a quick Google search, you can join the global Permablitz movement"….
Permaculture goin’ mainstream, one small news story at a time.
Since I have your attention, if you’re looking to take a PDC on Oahu’s North Shore this August, be sure to check out our upcoming course! (July 30 — August 12, 2012.)
Comments (6)Permaculture & Life at 61° N – The Cycle of Life and Time
General — by Kevin Jarvis June 9, 2012
Life at 61° N here in Sweden can offer some interesting challenges including nearly sunless days in winter to nearly darkless days in summer. Bill Mollison and Geoff Lawton say that local site restrictions on a permaculture design make outside the box possibilities become available or brought into view. So while there are many challenges given us from nature and our environment there are an equal number of solutions and opportunities. In most northern areas villages have much smaller populations and so there is much more free and open land. We have plentiful hunting and fishing and more availability of the vast forest systems. I’ll be writing more about permaculture in other stories here in central Sweden but in this article I’d like to give you an overview of the seasons and life at 61° N.
Comments (4)More Good Excuses
General — by Craig Mackintosh PRI Editor April 25, 2012
PRI Australia Permaculture Design Certificate (PDC) graduates, April 2012
Click here for larger view, or here for even larger!
All photos © Craig Mackintosh
I recently briefed you on the fact that I was visiting New Zealand. Today I put up a little more evidence of this (don’t worry, I’ll be adding more from the NZ trip over the ensuing weeks, as I have time). Anyway, now I find myself in Australia, staying at the PRI home base — Zaytuna Farm, in northern NSW.
Comments (4)Good Excuses
General — by Craig Mackintosh PRI Editor April 10, 2012
Photos © Craig Mackintosh
I thought I had better break the silence by letting you know I haven’t fallen off the edge of the earth, but am currently in New Zealand, collecting interesting notes, photos and video for you all. You should find it worth the wait, but thanks for your patience and I’ll write when I can!
Wise Words From an Elder
General — by Anthea Hudson February 28, 2012
Flinders Ranges, South Australia, Adnyamathanha Yarta
The old Adnyamathanha man places another log on the fire before sitting back down beside me. Uncle, as we will call him in the traditional Adnyamathanha way, stares into the flames for a minute, then begins to speak.
Comments (6)The Well-Rounded Permaculturist
General — by Michael Pilarski November 16, 2011
by Michael Pilarski, Friends of the Trees Society
So what is permaculture? What makes it different from: organic gardening? organic farming? sustainable agriculture? ecological agriculture? bio-dynamic farming? regeneration farming? forest gardening? Holistic Resource Management HRM? ecosystem restoration? sustainability? or natural building?
Permaculture is unique, yet at the same time includes all of the above. Permaculture is the design of sustainable human settlement. One of the most important things about permaculture is that it’s a synthesis of agriculture, ecology, and forestry. Permaculture is inter-disciplinary as will be outlined in this article.
Comments (7)Permaculture Featured on New York Times
General, News — by Craig Mackintosh PRI Editor July 29, 2011
We all know the world is looking for answers to very pressing questions — so it’s high time the mainstream media started to share them! As such, it’s great to see the following article on the New York Times website. Thanks to New York Times writer Michael Tortorello, and well done to Wayne Weiseman, David Cody, Scott Pittman and the many others involved in this piece:
As a way to save the world, digging a ditch next to a hillock of sheep dung would seem to be a modest start. Granted, the ditch was not just a ditch. It was meant to be a “swale,” an earthwork for slowing the flow of water down a slope on a hobby farm in western Wisconsin.
And the trenchers, far from being day laborers, had paid $1,300 to $1,500 for the privilege of working their spades on a cement-skied Tuesday morning in late June.
Fourteen of us had assembled to learn permaculture, a simple system for designing sustainable human settlements, restoring soil, planting year-round food landscapes, conserving water, redirecting the waste stream, forming more companionable communities and, if everything went according to plan, turning the earth’s looming resource crisis into a new age of happiness.
It was going to have to be a pretty awesome ditch.
That was the sense I took away from auditing four days of a weeklong Permaculture Design Certificate course led by Wayne Weiseman, 58, the director of the Permaculture Project, in Carbondale, Ill. — The Permaculture Movement Grows From Underground
As per the New York Times, "A version of this article appeared in print on July 28, 2011, on page D1 of the New York edition with the headline: Growing From Underground."
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