Ryan Harb, MS, LEED AP

Permaculture author Peter Bane speaks in Amherst this Thursday, December 13 – 6pm @Food For Thought books. His talk is entitled “Designing Resilient Communities: How our Towns and Suburbs can Incubate the new Eco-Agriculture and Launch a Food Security Revolution”

Book signing to follow! Hope to see many of you there and more info below.

Designing Resilient Communities: How our Towns and Suburbs can Incubate the new Eco-Agriculture and Launch a Food Security Revolution

with Peter Bane

 

Please join us Thursday, December 13th at 6 pm at Food For Thought Books, 106 N Pleasant St. Amherst for a talk and book signing with Peter Bane.

Peter Bane is the author of The Permaculture Handbook: Garden Farming for Town and Country (2012), an authoritative guide to the world’s leading popular design science for North American readers. Long the publisher and editor of Permaculture Activist, and a teacher and landscape designer who has worked in both temperate and tropical regions of the Americas, he is now pioneering a microfarm on the edge of Bloomington, Indiana.

 

“For readers with a quarter-acre lot or a small farm, in the city, suburbs, or beyond, The Permaculture Handbook offers a clear and comprehensive picture of what low-impact, high-satisfaction living can look like in the post-petroleum age. Starting now, readers can locate themselves easily within the narrative of growing land care, regenerative community, and a robust and capable household economy. Learn how to reduce dependence on money, on fossil fuels, and on distant supplies of critical resources. The book answers such vital questions as: How much food will the family need; what kinds of crops are most important and valuable to grow; where can we invest our scarce financial resources for the biggest return; how can the farm enhance local ecosystems and communities; what tools and machines are really needed to take care of the land; and a thousand others. More importantly, it teaches the reader how to make complex decisions about land and livelihood consistent with new and emerging economic and ecological realities.”

 

This event is co- sponsored by Mobile Design Lab, Permaculture f.e.a.s.t, the Conway School of Landscape Design, Umass Permaculture , Greenfield Community College Permaculture Initiative, and Food Forest Farm

Hi Friends,

I have an urgent message to share, and don’t normally post in this way, but it is extremely important that you all know this. Our brothers and sisters in the Ecuadorian rainforest are under significant pressure right from the oil companies, who are planning to auction off 10 million acres of pristine rainforest for oil extraction. This is the same place that I visited in Ecuador just two months ago, so it really hits home for me.

Donald digs near an oil site in Northern Ecuador – all of the surrounding land (and groundwater) is completely contaminated. This is what will happen to the 10 million acres of rainforest if we don’t stop it.

The 10 million acres is the largest contiguous rainforest left on Earth – and one of the most biodiverse and culturally diverse places on the planet. If this happens, the majority of people will be left with a much lower quality of life – health problems, polluted water, poverty – with only a few getting rich off the suffering of others. Please join us in signing this letter and sharing this message widely. This is a very important battle that could set a precedent for keeping oil below ground and respecting indigenous rights across the world. It means literal life or death for them. Thank you everyone – the people of the Amazon appreciate your help enormously.

Please sign the letter and watch a short video here: http://amazonwatch.org/take-action/stop-the-11th-round-oil-auction-in-ecuador

Please forward this message to others to raise awareness about this, time is of the essence.

Appreciating your support enormously,
Ryan

Thank you!

Last month, as many of you know, The UMass Permaculture Initiative released its Part 3/3 video entitled “Growing a Model Sustainable Campus”. Upon release of the video, the UMass Permaculture team received a friendly challenge from UMass Dining Services and the Stockbridge School of Agriculture. If the video received 10,000 Youtube views in its first month, the two departments would contribute funds toward planting fruit trees at three Amherst Elementary Schools.

You can view the new UMass Permaculture documentary video here:

Over the last two years, we’ve been filming and putting together this piece (big thanks to Adaptive Media!) which we think captures the essence of what our project is all about. The video illustrates how students, staff, faculty, and the local community are transforming UMass Amherst into a model sustainable campus. We’re not there yet, but are moving in a very positive direction.  

The Results:

When the clock struck midnight on Sunday, September 30, our team rejoiced as the official video count read 10,710 Youtube views. Now, our permaculture group will expand the amazing program we’ve co-created, together, beyond the UMass campus and into the local community.

This October, the UMass Permaculture team will begin planting fruit trees at the Fort River, Wildwood and Crocker Farm Elementary Schools in Amherst, Massachusetts. Our vision is for this to be only the beginning of a much larger partnership between the Amherst Public Schools and numerous departments at UMass Amherst.

Next semester, UMass students will work with students, parents and teachers at each elementary school to plan larger permaculture garden installations during the spring. Eventually, we envision each school having edible landscapes that can be used for educational purposes while also providing food to the cafeterias.

This project, called “Permaculture in the Pioneer Valley” will be part of a new permaculture studies academic program in the UMass Stockbridge School of Agriculture.

The UMass Permaculture team has set a new goal of 50,000 Youtube views for the video by next year at this time.

We think this video can be an inspiration to others and our hope is to see it spread far and wide. Together, we are creating a sustainable future that all of us can envision. And we want to share that vision with others.

A sustainable vision for how the UMass Amherst campus can look, and inspiring other campuses to do the same.

Thank you to everyone who helped this video go viral, thus inspiring more permaculture in the Western, Massachusetts area and beyond! We are truly able to continue this work only because of your support. We appreciate it enormously, and so do our future generations.