Permaculture - Peak Oil - The Source of Permaculture Vision and Innovation

<body><h1>PERMACULTURE</H1> <h2>What Is Permaculture?</h2> <p>A more current definition of <strong>permaculture</strong>, which reflects the expansion of focus implicit in Permaculture One, is 'Consciously designed landscapes which mimic the patterns and relationships found in nature, while yielding an abundance of food, fibre and energy for provision of local needs. People, their buildings and the ways in which they organise themselves are central to permaculture. Thus the permaculture vision of permanent or sustainable agriculture has evolved to one of permanent or sustainable culture.</p> <h2>"Melliodora" Hepburn Permaculture Gardens</h2> <em>Hepburn Permaculture Gardens </em>is situated on the edge of Hepburn Springs, the spa centre in Central Victoria. See map for directions below. It is one of the best documented and well known permaculture gardens sites in Australia. The passive solar house, mixed food gardens, orchards, dams and livestock, and creek revegetation show how permaculture design can help to restore and improve land, provide for residents needs and enjoyment in a cool inland climate. Following purchase in 1985, the one hectare property has been developed from a blackberry covered wasteland into a model of small scale intensive permaculture, relevant to both large town blocks and small rural allotments. * Featured on ABC television; Gardening Australia (1998) and Landline (2004). * One of 12 case studies in sustainable agriculture featured Museum of Victoria's Future Harvest Exhibition. * The book, Melliodora: Ten Years of Sustainable Living, and the new eBook update, Melliodora 1985 to 2005, provide the complete design and story. * Guided tours provide a insight into permaculture design to inspire those moving to a more wholistic way of life and lots of practical information to help make the change. <h2>Peak Oil</h2> <p>David Holmgren has been joined by Richard Heinberg, leading environmental educator from California, on a public speaking tour explaining the truth and opportunities of <strong>Peak Oil</strong> and the coming end of cheap energy. As well as taking the message to a larger public audiences in big capital city venues, this tour aims to make clear the sustainable alternatives to the "war that will never end in our lifetimes" and the "something will save our unsustainable addictions" stories which are the default reactions to the realities of peak oil.</p> <p>This tour is providing resources for the sceptical to get up to speed on the coming changes as well as inspiration and empowerment for those already on the path of a more productive and saner way of life. It aims to cement the connections between emerging peak oil activism and 25 years of permaculture inspired activism on creative bottom up solutions to energy crisis.</p> <p>While the historic peaking and decline in world oil supply is becoming more widely discussed in the media, it is a bad news story to rival climate change. Heinberg and Holmgren make a great team to distill the key understandings behind the avalanche of confusing information and empower people to take Peak Oil as the upheaval which will call us to refocus on opportunities to rebuild personal and household self reliance and relocalise our community and economies using a diverse range of familiar and novel strategies pioneered by the permaculture and related movements over the last 30 years.</p> <h2>The Permaculture Design System</h2> <p>More precisely permaculture is a "design system based on ecological principles" which provides the organising framework for implementing the above vision. In this more limited, but important sense it draws together the diverse skills and ways of living which need to be rediscovered and developed to empower us to move from being dependant consumers to becoming responsible producers.</p> <p>In this sense, permaculture is not the landscape, or even the skills of organic gardening, sustainable farming, energy efficient building or eco-village development as such, but can be used to design, establish, manage and improve these and all other efforts made by individuals, households and communities towards a sustainable future.</p> <h3>The Permaculture Movement</h3> <p>Permaculture is also a world wide network and movement of individuals and groups working in both rich and poor countries on all continents. Largely unsupported by government or business, these people are contributing to a sustainable future by reorganising their life and work around permaculture design principles. In this way they are creating small local changes but ones which are directly and indirectly influencing action in the wider environment, organic agriculture, appropriate technology, communities and other movements for a sustainable world. 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