Food production where it's really needed.

Name

• emergency permaculture, emergency sustainable agriculture
• it seems to be hitting the top of the list recently
• see larahna's WHTC project, the covertible community concept
• it's not permaculture at all cos permaculture is "by definition" slow, but i don't really know

it probably doesn't have a name ....yet!!!!!

• i think we will eventually need to develop a new "term" for this line of thought
• i havent ben hit with inspiration for what to call it yet
• we'll have to hit the concept, and it'll hit us back
• ESA is all that i've come up with so far
• emergency sustainability plan for agriculture
• emergency sustainable agriculture?
• the ESA plan for region X
• the ESA plan for region Y
• so it'll be ESA^12 if there are 12 zones

Concept

here is what i see as essential for a convertible community ... a solution that provides

1. . a pre-planned solution to restore (or more likely take) a community to levels of sustainability as quickly as possible
2. . a means for working throug the variables that crisis can present like climate, land condition, region
3. . a kit resonse that provides at least 12 months of planned agriculture and the seeds to correspond
4. . monkey proof training to allow crisis stricken people to get their act together and not starve when the rations run out!
5. . ensuring that the nutritional optimization of crops is considered. the most nutrient and calories possible

• sum-up: a set of physical objects and implementable procedures (for advisors and implementers) that lets people go from crisis to post-crisis effectively, swiftly and practically
  • convertible communities (or spaces) need to be prepared in advance = crisis hits means it's too late to be ordering seed catalogs
  • i belive the time is rapidly approaching where "in theory" is not good enough

Chat (to be digested)

so, thinking about say a family of 4, or a group of 100, that would mean something you can drop off from a parachute, with a cubic yard of stuff

using available:

• land, with knowledge about how to make the best use of available land, and about what's the best land (aka logical anti-crisis zones, which would not be urban centers), i.e. where do you locate convertible centers?
  • FEMA maps
  • WHTC is the natural , logical place for a pandemic flu attack in Atlanta, GA. Far enough from coastal weather threats. Close enough to siphon off people from the flu attack. And decent weather for year round growing.
  • we'd need many such places, so the criteria for selection + the data (satellite) data = a list of real places
• water
• whatever other natural resources that we can't possibly include in the parachutable box

• take that and crunch it and you geet somting like sweet potatoes, peanuts, collard greens, etc...
• a list of many real places
• take that global!
• the attack:
  • so if the "attack" is present poverty, then it's a matter of acting now
  • if the attack is foreseable poverty, as in credit crunch etc, then it's real soon now
  • if the attack is a flu pandemic, then it's whenever it happens, or now if you want to, or on weekends if you're not sure

• WHTC can take (a bit theory being put into practice) 200 families each with about 2500 cash and abilit y to earn $50/month and make them sustainable, and sheltered ... and even throw in health care. $1000 up front ... about $1500 to build ultra cheap housing and $50/month upkeep.
• that's a fix for the economic crash but minds must change!
• i need 200 believers with $1K each! and its a done deal! and really i could do it with 50 believers

• one more thing for massive stuff: use available resources and build on that - for example, here we grow bananas, so maybe convert some of that land to other things, be ready to do that

• the payoff is they/you'd be building the booklet for many others, for that price

• the project holds 10 acres in reserve..5 initially used for spiritual wellness stuff and 5 for training but on paper that could support additional crisis only lots!
• you want believers who are not already in another group? could you accept an already formed group?
• like camp pads that tie into the off-grid grid for temporary holding of people
• camp pads? extra lots?
• yes not big enough to grow on but able to put up a structure for temp living!
• think camping pad...20'x20' somthing like that
• that's 20x33=around 7x7 meters, i see
• not for food growing at all
• thats about 20/acre vs. the 1/10 acre lots that an individual or small family would have
• still thinking the intensive sub-acreage gardening direction
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polis there's a model there, maybe - small village + acres around it
• so it's containers and seeds and booklet
• maybe print-on-demand booklet, with local satelite data feed in
• with tech..it could be dvd,s or such
• i mean, the whole encyclopedia would be huge, but here? here you do A, B, C.
• a friend in religiouscircles did a huge info database that was on cd but if you had internet when you clicked the links it went live online and got you current info..if your were offline it got you archived data from disk
• it was like 100,000 pages of info! on 1 disk
• http://www.appropedia.org/Global_Food_Swadeshi_Project -- here are all the factors, well, the general factors at least

• we need a group of people around this, really
• a vision/outline + plug-in modules
• this needs heavy thinking
• but i think its critical
• i am feeling this convertible community/space concept is going to be of vital importance soon
• i can look at it from my perspective - work on it as a real thing (which it is)
• i think if you take out the threates even ... its still a robust chunk to push through. the threats are the why do it ...
• i can "sell" it as a thought experiment: what if we wanted to reach sustainability in 4 months?

+1 month for preparation

• i mean, if we want sustainability, why not do that experiment?
• well yes .. it's like if crisis were to hit in january ... what's the next planting opportunity and what would you plant
• as in "what would it look like?"
• but the plan needs to be fluid so if it hit in june ... the same info would be available, just modified for the seasonal change
• so no matter when crisis hits, there is a plan and the can covers 12 months..so there is a jan and a feb and march packet, etc
• so "season" is one factor, a variable in the model, an input variable that leads to spitting out * a specific booklet - 50 pages out of 100000 pages
• season/climate
• it's planting almanac meets can o seeds!
• so, we need to simplify realities and look at a bunch of them, not at a thousand different realities
• it will give you planing guides..if you hav ethis soil you need to construct raised beds or use a liner system cause crap will grow in your soil...or greenhouse or.....or....or.... a plan a, b,c

there are only a few zones...so if we start with perhaps the growing zones and move out from there

• i'll summarise the aims for our page, maybe over at the emergency-permaculture appropedia page, and then suggest an outline
• if we took it from a zone by zone basis. could we pair an almanac planting guide with some intel on the most nutritious efficient mix..something like that
• and basic gardening tech...sq ft, key hole, the skills of gardeing and spit out an ondemand guide

• outline = why, what, how, what-if ... but with specific terms
• why = brief summary of reasons to join in
• what = what such a place would look like, how things would work
• how = things needed for us to get there
• what-if = exploration of other ideas we might want to include in the model
• and there's the sense of urgency, yes
• i don't fully agree with the "emergency permaculture" term, but that we're using is as a provocation = something you use as a springboard to real ideas

• there must be some work done already, on zones
• i think zones will reduce the bulk of it
• and get it manageable
• i guess it looks like a tree: biosphere ... 12 zones ... 12 thousand microzones
• most seed guides use about a dozen zones
• so i think that's right on
• so we need to look for the wide-enough, simple-enough branch level if that makes sense
• shouldn't be hard to find out. i hve some seed catalogs
• http://www.usna.usda.gov/Hardzone/ushzmap.html
• perhaps there is a global chart
• but i think that is a good breakdown plan. "usda hardiness zones"
• plantings are based on this scale
• if you are zone 9 you should plant this and this during these periods
• http://www.thegardenersresource.com/hardinesszones.html

if we make sure the zones correspond consistently so a zone 7 in the UK or US...same climate

variables in soil, etc. but similar kits would work

i need a global map - and i'll look at the concepts behind the map - you see, in the canary islands there are microclimates

consistency

i'm sure i'll find it. i can find us and uk pretty easily...i'll probably need to search for each continent

well, we'll have to translate hardiness, maybe wikipedia has the translations and look at the concepts behind it, too

africa: http://www.plantideas.com/zone/africa.html (need to talk to neighbours in some circumstances)

External links

• Emergency Permaculture kits