Designing Ecological Habitats - Gaia Education

village-scale water catcHments in nepal 135
The Himalayan foothill states of
Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand
have achieved one of the most rapid
extensions of SRI to date. Starting
with just 40 farmers in 2006, there
were 597 farmers using the new
methods in 2007 while this year,
there are about 13,000 farmers using
SRI. See http://ciifad.cornell.edu/
sri/ for more details of SRI.
Conclusions
The settled hills and mountains of
Nepal offer tremendous potential
for diverse annual and perennial
cropping systems. This potential
can be reached through sustainable management of water resources in the
catchments of the plethora of rivers that run through the country. Starting
with conservation and regeneration of existing resources of forest, soil,
water and biodiversity, many techniques exist that can help to increase soil
moisture to the benefit of crop diversification and ultimate improvement in
productivity. Permaculture design can help to integrate these methods within
traditional cultural and social systems to create a flourishing economy as
well as domestic self reliance.
Chris Evans has lived and worked in Nepal since 1985, co-founding the Jajarkot
Permaculture Programme (JPP), a diverse array of projects spanning 65 villages, and a
membership of 12,000 farmers.
In 2001 he published the Farmers Handbook of over 40 farmer-friendly appropriate
technologies (see http://www.green-shopping.co.uk/books/ebooks/free-ebooks.
html). He currently works as advisor to the Himalayan Permaculture Centre (www.
himalayanpermaculture.com).
Beside his grass-roots experience in Nepal, Chris has taught permaculture in UK, India,
U.S.A. and Mexico. He currently lives in South Wales, where he teaches local permaculture
courses and is involved in the transition initiative in his local town. He is also a partner
in Designed Visions (www.designedvisions.com), a permaculture education and design
consultancy.
A stand of SRI rice
nearing maturity.
Each clump, with up
to 80 tillers, comes
from one seedling,
planted here at 40cm
spacing.