Growing your own sustainable food forest

This 12-day Permaculture Design Course, facilitated by Jamie Shepherd, is run as a Correspondence Course, which includes practical and interactive weekends where you can practice what you’ve learnt.

Essentially, when each group of 8 students have completed all their assignments and have a good understanding, they will be invited to the weekend workshops in Fourways, Gauteng.

Furthermore, enrolment includes invitation to ALL future practical and interactive weekends - giving you the opportunity to clear additional questions, improve your practical skills and help new students, or just enjoy the company of like-minded people.

Lectures and assignments will be sent to you over a period of 8 weeks, and there’s no time-limit for completing assignments.

If you attended one of Jamie’s weekend workshops that was not the be all and end all of the practicalities of garden layout. The practical component of this program covers some things you haven’t done before.

What is permaculture?

Bill Mollison copyrighted the term “Permaculture” to protect the planet and the public from misrepresentation of the term. There is much genocidal misrepresentation of the term which is illegal in terms of copyright law. Jamie did his PDC with Bill Mollison and qualified in terms of his conditions to teach Permaculture. He also has a B.Sc. in analytical natural resource geography and botany. He has created gardens that create their own rain through droughts and improve soil fertility over time.

Common mis-representations of the term “Permaculture” include:

1. “A permaculture is a designed ecosystem.” This is a partial truth which omits the principle of “allowing systems to find their own evolution.” A garden is a relationship between a gardener and a sentient ecosystem. Relationships based on force are destructive.

2. Insufficient training in applied eco-hydrology in the desert and famine belt in which South Africa is situated.

3. Invasion biology. This will destroy natures attempts to balance human population pressure with disastrous consequences.

4. Confusion of permaculture with labour intensive organic gardening systems which do not hold water, multiply growth vigour, minimise labour and maintenance costs or develop a pulse and a soul of their own.

the course will teach you:

1. How to produce crops in less than 2 months.
2. How to cycle moisture within the system and improve rainfall.
3. How to increase the productive capacity of your system over the years.
4. How to maintain a continuity of production and avoid the feast and famine syndrome.
5. How to create a self regulating productive ecosystem that can survive without maintenance and still produce a continuity of annual crops.
6. Equip you with do-able practical skills that will empower you to apply what you learn yourself.
7. Empower you with a real ownership and connection with your self regulating food forest ecosystem as an extension of yourself; your habitat.
8. How to grow an organic soil from seed on degraded land.

COURSE STRUCTURE:

The whole process will require about the same time commitment as a 12 day P.D.C. Working through it in your own time will allow you to inwardly digest it much more effectively.

1. Correspondence Component:

Includes e-mailed lectures and assignments which you should submit to me for my comments. The lectures will be sent to you over a period of 8 weeks. There is no time limit on completing the assignments. I will continue coaching you until I know that you have understood.

2. Practical and Interactive Weekend:

When 8 students have completed their assignments to my satisfaction a practical and interactive weekend will be scheduled in the Fourways area of Gauteng; in consultation with them. Those students who have not completed their assignments will simply be invited to the next practical and interactive weekend when they are ready. Essential practical layout skills will be demonstrated and practised, observations will be made in our demo garden and interactive discussion of the course content will be facilitated. You will go home knowing that you know how to get started in applying what you have been studying.

Enrolment on this program includes invitation to all future practical and interactive weekends. This will give you the opportunity to clear additional questions, improve your practical skills or to just enjoy the company of like minded people and help new students.

CERTIFICATES WILL BE AWARDED ON COMPLETION OF THE PRACTICAL AND INTERACTIVE COMPONENT.

3. Functional Classification:

Enrolment on this program includes membership of a work in progress: The functional classification of food forest elements for the desert and famine belt. This is in the form of a spreadsheet classical taxonomic framework into which edible and useful species and their functional characteristics can be inserted. In this way I am building a picture of correlations between the ecological functions of species, genera and families of plants, animals and micro-organisms and the internationally accepted species classification system.

It is a database to which members may refer for selecting and sourcing appropriate species to add to their productive ecosystems and also contribute relevant information. There are over 20 000 edible species on the planet and that does not include those with other uses.

Biodiversity is key to the ability of an ecosystem to survive the extremes of the external environment. You will be able to access ongoing updates of this database on a members web page. I will reserve the right to moderate contributions to this data base.

12 day Permaculture Design Course, Correspondence - Any time
Cost: R 2584 (tuition only)
Practical weekends: Own accommodation and lunch
Contact: foodforestinfo@gmail.com

ENROLMENT:

Payment of the tuition fee of R2584 can be made into the following account:

Food Forests for Africa
Nedbank
Current Account
Account no.: 1238007872
Branch code: 123825
Branch name: Business Center, Pietermaritzburg.

Photos

Source: Permaculture Pioneers