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© It Renewing Permacuiture creates living systems using co-operation with nature ‘and each other. It designs practical rural or urban environments using the diversity, stability and resilience of natural ecosystems, empowering people to be part of real solutions. signs along the footpath saying, “Please pick the fruit”. So there are surpluses occurring over different seasons after the third year.So three to six years - after six years you're into NEXUS interviews Permaculture pioneer Bill Mollison. heavy yields. At one site I had almost a tonne of al- Nexus: You've been working with permacul- with gardens, people could own them in five iy sroncsottnences this year. I’ve been going ture for a long time now. years. Butif we didn’t, they would never own “hat therefor six years, since the inception, Bill Mollison: Yes, an unconscionably long them because the interest kept beatipgtfem |-‘and it's remarkable now how much food is time - about fourteen or fifteen years. So the difference in having fg viyetming-o of It’s a medium- N: How would you describethe aims of Per- supply and therefore half your ji fd a 4) its own food. maculture? able is great. The Permacult geRso “|. like fish and BM: Oh, they change all the time, We’ve has proper disposal of wasp oye they could achieved a lot of aims in that we’ve setup a banking system thatis allre¢ fi good educational system and design; that tothe village and second as, ie es parkways was an early aim. One success is we’ve villages or groups. It wo a roads and generated more teachers - although we're education system, its ow Reg pital gain very short of teachers - who are teaching in minding centres - like the lilt ind A house their own languages in their own countries. education training going on here; no ‘© mes what it The aims keep on changing and our cur- suburbia. And its own sma \, Was wortlsix vearspgoaf e’s awaiting rent aim is to become developers, topurchase commercial centres and light inttig 4 ey, sfTo uv f cies. So’ these developments and develop properties or villages and to N: What size population are you ledking al? | vfigt use very low-energy expenditures and have the developmental capital for that. I BM: Well, for full employment wit (the. ahha are yery much in demand. guess we’ll get there too - we seem to achieve village structure, at a thousand peop N= Peopie ¢an see it’s relatively easy to aGhueve... iciency in the country, but how would you do it in the suburbs? BM: There are people who do it. The very first design that I ever did in 1975 was in the industrial suburb of Thombury, Melbourne. our aims, That's the worst part of success - slightly larger everybody would be em- where do you go from there? ployed in the village. Maybe as many as 30% [ } or 40% percent of people would work ‘loca- a K P ri tion-free’ - people who write books or are in ..we can build a village in | service to the outside as consultants, for the desert that p rovides instance. You could bike or walk to work and There was a small group of people who J . if, the amount of transportneeded would betiny slowly bought up a city block as it became itse if with water and could be provided by a small delivery available. They had houses touching each , service plus a truck for trade and a little local other along the back, so they took down a lot N: So how does Permaculture development taxi service, differ from normal development? BM: We bring all the sustainable forms of development in - a village we’d develop would contain more than sufficient food and would catch all its own water from rainwater, in filtration tanks. If we were very lucky we could also have a supply from a steam. But ifnot we can build a village in the desert that can provide itself with water. Then the houses are largely self-ener- gised by the design of the building for space, heating and cooling, either by use of a small amount of solar power in each house or by some other form of power. For instance, if we had a little stream we'd simply putin a small hydro system, so that the need for people to eam would by sharply reduced. The average of the fences and they put in a wood work- shop, metal workshop, pottery and children’s house, which was an old garage. ‘They closed off a couple of lanes and had chickens, ducks and all their fruit. They spent $7 per person per month. So $84 a year covered their food. Regreening the City Slowly, they went to work on the houses - adding little glass houses and cool houses to bring cold draught in the heat - and efficient heating systems. But that’s by remaking poorly designed houses. It’s been in continu- ous evolution since 1975. It’s a nice litle jungle. N; How long would it take - from scratch -to family today spends 46% of its earnings on get to self-sufficiency and surplus? N: So you'd be looking at a city block size. food and 19% onenergy. We think wecan cut BM: Well, if you go on data from California BM: Yes; well you can work on two blocks. down on individual expense by 70-80% - - about three years after you start you’re Ifyou have an association of friends who live which frees up a lot of capital. In fact, in about 80% sufficient in food. After that it in the city and all agree to move intoa district Brazil we found if we could provide houses gets a bit embarrassing - there are a lot of as any house becomes available - sell whcre g NEXUS New Times Eight - Autumn 1989 Permaculture the Planet Permacuiture creates living systems using co-operation with nature ‘and each other. It designs practical rural or urban environments using the diversity, stability and resilience of natural ecosystems, empowering people to be part of real solutions. NEXUS interviews Permaculture pioneer Bill Mollison. NEXUS if - Autumn 1989 Regreening the City