Warren Brush presents at the Tenth International Permaculture Conference (IPC10), Amman, Jordan, September 2011 Photograph © Craig Mackintosh I consider it a privilege to be a friend of Warren Brush, and it’s been a pleasure to see his rapid development in all things Permaculture. In his presentation at the IPC10 (Amman, Jordan, September 2011) Warren [...]

A new road-building programme will drain money from essential services. by George Monbiot: journalist, author, academic and environmental and political activist, United Kingdom. The money has run out, or so we keep being told. There are no funds left for any but essential projects: the frontline services and the capital spending which cannot be deferred. Councils [...]

The Rodale Institute’s 30-year Farming Systems Trial report (1.3mb PDF) The Rodale Institute has been, for a full 30 years now, conducting a long-term comparative Farming Systems Trial. Starting in 1981, when it was already abundantly clear that industrialising [...]

by Lester Brown, Earth Policy Institute For almost as long as I can remember we have been saying that the United States, with 5 percent of the world’s people, consumes a third or more of the earth’s resources. That was true. It is no longer true. Today China consumes more basic resources than the United States [...]

by The Cornicopia Institute A revelatory report released by The Cornucopia Institute, an organic industry watchdog, has stirred controversy in the natural foods marketing arena by highlighting abusive marketing practices by some of the nation’s largest breakfast cereal manufacturers. In some cases, companies such as Kellogg’s, Quaker Oats (PepsiCo), Barbara’s Bakery and Whole Foods [...]

This is the concluding article in the series A Solar Powered Life which looks at the various issues, compromises and components of an off-grid (standalone) solar power system. In previous articles I have written about the individual components in this system, but in this article I’ll explain how all of these components are connected. It’s [...]

by Jeffrey M. Smith, Institute for Responsible Technology After more than 40,000 votes on 139 designs, here is the winning design chosen by Threadless – and we love it! It makes people laugh, tells a story, raises questions, and starts a conversation. Wear it for GMO rallies! Buy them as holiday gifts! Give one to [...]

Editor’s Note: For background on this report, see Paul’s previous post. On the 1st August 2011 the Permaculture Network Ghana undertook a project in collaboration with Harvesters Mission at Alhassan Akuraa, which includes a food forest establishment, nursery establishment, paddock systems, soil treatment and the likes. Alhassan Akuraa is a village located in the [...]

If this analysis is correct, a Great Depression is all but inevitable. by George Monbiot: journalist, author, academic and environmental and political activist, United Kingdom. I stumbled out into the autumn sunshine, figures ricocheting around in my head, still trying to absorb what I had heard. I felt as if I had just attended a funeral: a [...]

At the International Permaculture Conference (IPC10) we treated attendees to the very first showing of the Urban Permaculture DVD. At the time I was personally too busy to watch it myself, but just last night finally sat down to do so. In short, it was totally inspirational. It gave me lots of practical ideas for [...]