Greening the desert

Can you green a desert? Yes, you can.

Words are worthless. See the result.

Towards Permaculture Centres Worldwide

Only three year funding for each site is needed. Then it will be sustainable for the future indefinitely employing local people and improving local food supply!

Solving Africa's Food Problem

The first "green revolution" called for by the former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan in 2004 has been producing good result.

Countries, such as Malawi, have transformed their food production using relatively simple means: With the help of government subsidies, farmers can now obtain two bags of fertilizer and five kilograms of hybrid maize seed at just 25 percent of the actual price. And, whereas the World Bank and other donors have refrained from such agricultural subsidies over the past few decades due to concerns about corruption, they are now supporting them and refocusing on agriculture as a priority. "It's a 180-degree turn for the better," Sanchez says. "You can avoid corruption by keeping it on a small scale."

Bill Gate is now charging for a second green revolution

"The charge is clear—we have to develop crops that can grow in a drought; that can survive in a flood; that can resist pests and disease," Gates added. "We need higher yields on the same land in harsher weather." The answer, at least in part? Sustainability paired with genetic modification.

Gates also called for a more environmentally focused effort this time around. "The next Green Revolution has to be greener than the first," Gates said. It "must be guided by smallholder farmers, adapted to local circumstances, and sustainable for the economy and the environment. The last thing anyone should do is create short-term gains for poor farmers that have long-term costs for their children.

Basing on fossil fuel based fertiliser will make these farmers continuously is not sustainable in the long run as we know that fossil fuel is a limited natural resource which is not renewable. A better solution would be to adapt/adopt a permacultural path. Here is a video showing how permaculture is applied to green the desert in the middle east. [source]


Cross posted to Atheist Bible Reading and Forum

FutureScenarios.org

from a recent Permablitz newsletter

Come gaze with us now, into the future. For that is where we are heading, inexorably, the future. Will it be robot housemaids, or ruthless scavengers living on the arctic fringe in a post-oil climate-change nightmare?

Or not quite like either?

Indeed there is little in the world of futurology which looks between these extremes, which looks towards low energy futures with a nuanced vision.

Permaculture co-originator David Holmgren weighs in to fill this gap, drawing on 30 years of permaculture thinking. He envisions four possible post oil peak futures.

Start Solving Global Problem at our Own Backyard

I wrote about Aquaponics before. By producing food locally, we reduce transportation. By using insects and bacteria from nature, we also help reduce waste.

Permaculture is another approach which gets inspiration from nature. [following quote from wikipedia]

In permaculture and forest gardening, seven layers are identified:

1. The canopy
2. Low tree layer (dwarf fruit trees)
3. Shrubs
4. Herbaceous
5. Rhizosphere (root crops)
6. Soil Surface (cover crops)
7. Vertical Layer (climbers, vines)

The 8th layer, or Mycosphere (fungi), is often included in layering.

A mature ecosystem such as ancient woodland has a huge number of relationships between its component parts: trees, understory, ground cover, soil, fungi, insects and other animals. Plants grow at different heights. This allows a diverse community of life to grow in a relatively small space. Plants come into leaf and fruit at different times of year.

I found a gem at the Pirate Bay today and search for permacultur. The short (5 minutes) video talks about how a 10 acre desert land is turned into a food production lot. The video is called "Greening the Desert Permaculture in Action"