The Permaculture Way of Life

good afternoon

namaskar i have to admit i’ve had a

doomsday view of the world

for as long as i can remember i believe

the primary challenges of the future

are going to be the lack of clean

drinking water

nutritious food and clean air

ever since i became a mother i was keen

to save a piece of nature

for my children and my family i used to

tell my husband let’s find a way

to grow our own food and harvest our own

water

but living in mumbai with busy corporate

lives and no background in farming

it sounded like a crazy idea to pursue

it was in 2010 that a friend of us told

us about permaculture

she said permaculture or permanent

agriculture

was a way of farming in which you create

an ecosystem with plants animals

birds and insects and they come together

to create a highly productive food

forest

it was a system of design that works

with nature instead of against it

mimicking its patterns and using its

forces to do most of the work this idea

captured our imagination

and we decided this was something we

wanted to do

within a few weeks my husband left for

chandigarh which is our hometown

in search of agricultural land after

nearly being conned by a bunch of

property dealers

he zeroed in on a six-acre piece of land

on the foot of morney hills the land had

gentle slopes

and a village pond but no vegetation

apart from

half a dozen scraggy date pumps

the soil was yellow dry and compacted

it had no organic life it was simply

dirt

in fact our six-year-old said mama you

said we were buying a farm

and this looks like a desert

when we started designing the farm we

roped in a bunch of villagers

from the nearby village led by a

supervisor fondly known as pandaji

was a farmer at heart but to supplement

his a meager agricultural income

he had done various odd jobs like being

a contractor

managed a poultry farm and even run a

street side hubba

when i shared our plans of growing food

organically on this land

pandaji said madame

he acknowledged that chemical farming

had made farmers dependent

on synthetic fertilizers but maintained

that without them it was impossible to

grow anything

not just fertilizer he told us that

farmers were

buying seeds weedy sides and pesticides

year on year

and this was drowning them in debt

is there any other way to farm he asked

me

well i told him my research said there

was

but decades of ravaging our earth will

take some time to build back

systematic destruction of our soils will

need some investment

to make them fertile again we had been

taking from our planet

for so long we would have to give back

just a little in the monsoon of 2011

when we arrived at the farm to start

work we were in for a shock

our farm was completely flooded with a

rainwater deluge from the nearby mooney

hills

water flowed down the slopes with such

severe intensity

it took with it precious top soil and

destroyed several structures on the way

what was even more shocking was that the

next day

the sun was out and there wasn’t a drop

of water on the land

it had all run off within 24 hours

our permaculture books told us that we

had to manage this water

we had to slow it down soak it in

and store it so we started by building

swales

swales are trenches that you build

around contour lines

and these act as speed breakers for when

water flows down the hill

we then built a channel which would give

a defined path to the water as it flowed

through the land

and found its way to the ponds we lined

these channels with bamboos

date palms grasses which would slow down

the water and clean it

and finally we dug two large ponds and

four shallow pools

to collect and store this water

within a few years our water management

was completely in place

and today water flows through our land

like a song

whenever it rains not a drop leaves our

property

and on good days of rainfall we collect

up to 5 million liters of water

i have to admit one of my favorite sites

in the world

is to watch water flow through our farm

the first step in giving back to the

planet is planting trees

we decided to plant a thousand trees to

start with

pandiji was appalled at this plant he

said

madanji no farmer plants trees on their

land

because you cannot grow crops in the

shade of the trees

he also warned us that if you plant

trees on your land

the value of your property will drop

dramatically because no buyer wants to

buy land

with trees on it we explained to pandaji

that in permaculture trees are at the

heart of the design

they give permanence to the farm they

help build an ecosystem

they hold the soil in place they build

groundwater and build the fertility of

the soil

they also provide useful biomass which

helps to fertilize the topsoil

so it was important for us to plant

these trees

eventually a reluctant pandiji helped us

plant over 5000 trees

over the years ranging from fruits to

flowering to avenue medicinal

and native trees and this is what makes

up our food forest today

when i say trees i have to tell you

these were tiny saplings

some of which were not even a foot tall

and my husband was convinced that they

would never grow up to be full-fledged

trees and that we were just wasting our

time and money

but watching these trees grow year on

year has been one of the most rewarding

experiences

of our life today these trees provide a

microclimate

on our farm and are home to many species

of birds

at the heart of growing anything and

food

is the quality of soil to improve the

quality of soil we started adding cow

manure

so we would add cow manure and find some

temporary improvement in fertility

but then things would very quickly

return back to their original lifeless

state

what we didn’t know back then was that

soil is a living organism

comprising of billions of bacteria fungi

worms

and creepy crawlies of all sorts for

this life to sustain it needs organic

matter

and moisture and by the mistake we were

making

was that we were keeping our soils

uncovered and dry

which was killing the life within

tilling is the process of turning the

soil over

either by hand or with a tractor when

you turn the soil over

you expose it to the sun thereby drying

it out

and killing the life within a related

problem is that of weeds

because whenever you leave the soil

uncovered weeds will

grow very quickly just like

skin will always cover a wound on your

body

weeds will always cover exposed soil

and what we were doing by repeated

tilling was equivalent to

scraping off the scab on our wound

thereby never allowing the wound

to heal itself the act

of keeping your soils covered is called

mulching

when you mulch your soils weeds do not

grow

and when weeds do not grow you do not

need to till

so what we learned was that we had to do

three things we had to add the cow

manure

we had to start mulching and we had to

stop

tilling in the first summer

after planting our saplings the farm

help was running from pillar to post

trying to keep them hydrated in the 46

degree celsius heat

pandaji called frantically and said

madame

i knew we had to do something and my

internet research told me that we should

be mulching the sapling with some woody

leafy matter the problem was we had none

a chain of phone calls led me to a

nearby wood chip processing unit

and i ordered a truckload we took these

wood chips

and mulched all our thousand saplings

with the wood chips

and this prevented the evaporation

losses dramatically

and brought down our frequency of

watering from twice a day

to twice a week instead with such a

dramatic saving of water

and effort pandiji was impressed

and convinced that mulching was a good

thing to do

but it was still difficult to get him to

stop tilling and it still

is and i don’t blame him because every

time you harvest a crop

and leave the field bare weeds grow very

quickly on it

to prevent that we have to track to the

soil again before we can sow our next

crop

there is only one way to break the cycle

and that is to mulch

our soils extensively but where can a

farmer find such

large quantities of mulch by planting an

ecosystem of trees

which are now 30 to 40 feet in height we

use the branches

and prunings of these trees to make

mulch to

mulch our raised beds and fields

by planting an ecosystem of trees we

have created our own

in-house mulch factory

today our soils are sweet-smelling moist

and filled with life we can dig a pit

anywhere on the farm

and we find a handful of earthworms

pandiji says

the soil reminds him of what he saw as a

child

in the nearby morning hills the bacteria

and the fungus in the soil are

constantly breaking down nutrients

and mining minerals from the stones and

pebbles

think of it as a world wide web under

the ground

where nutrients are flowing from one

part to the other and being made

available to plants

just in time it’s a fascinating world

out there

and it is safe to assume that we know as

little

about the soil beneath our feet as we do

above the stars above our head

by 2013 our farm was beginning to

resemble a permaculture farm

we were now looking forward to a harvest

of fruits vegetables cereals and pulses

we enthusiastically planted saplings in

our raised beds

and sowed seeds in our field but

after a few weeks when we visited the

farm we found that most of our crops

were destroyed by pests

we were really disappointed that after

all our hard work and planning

we had lost crops to pest attack

pandiji had his i told you so moment

because he had constantly warned us

about farming without chemicals

i reached out into my organic farmer

network to find out why this was

happening and what i learned was this

we were not doing a few things which we

should have done

one our plants had low immunity

because of the absence of nutrients in

the soil

this made them very vulnerable to pest

attack two

there were no natural predators like

birds and lizards on the farm

and third we should be intercropping and

companion planting

so that no insect found a never-ending

stretch of food

to feast on as we built this nutrient

cycle

an important role was played by the

animals

on a farm every animal including man

has to earn its keep a farm is nothing

without the diversity of life that

animals birds and bees bring to it and

we feel blessed

that we are able to say share this space

with them

a chemical farm is not an ecosystem

it’s a stretch of lifeless soil in which

food is grown artificially with the help

of chemicals and machines

food is filled with harmful chemicals

which is causing havoc

with our health there have been

instances in the last eight years that

we’ve lost

dogs who simply drank the water from a

neighboring rice field

this is the same food that you and i are

consuming and there’s no surprise that

there’s so much sickness all around us

a permaculture farm in contrast is a

happy place

it’s pure and spiritual here we work

with nature

and nature gives us back by leaps and

bounds

once the flywheel of trees water

management

and soil restoration is set into motion

the productivity of the farm increases

year on year

today we are fully self-sufficient as a

farm we save our own seed

produce our own mulch harvest our own

rainwater and have loads of manure

we grow over a hundred crops ranging

from cereals to pulses to oil seeds

fruits vegetables herbs spices sugarcane

and even cotton pandaji is finally

convinced

that yes it is possible to grow organic

food

without chemicals we went in search of

uncontaminated food and water but we got

so much more on this journey

our children started spending more time

with nature than at malls and

restaurants

i’m proud that they can identify species

of trees

have a lot of compassion for animals and

are conscious of their own carbon

footprint

they have done their fair share in

turning what looked like a desert back

then

into a lush green food forest today

we turned vegetarian when we realized

that the animals we play with

are the animals we eat

we started evaluating industrial

products for their utility instead of

their fashion value

now things no longer seem attractive to

buy

we are slowing down our own consumption

and living more consciously

today we can put a nice meal on the

table that’s almost entirely grown with

us

by us we eat healthy homegrown food

harvest millions of liters of water and

our farm is an oxygen factory

our friends tell us that this is a

luxury but we believe this is a

necessity

for if health is wealth then growing

your own food is the new gold

you may be wondering that why don’t all

farmers

practice permaculture it is because

our farmers are dependent on their next

crop for their livelihood

they do not have the luxury to let go of

a few

cycles and allow the earth to rejuvenate

itself

this permaculture movement has to be led

by people like you

and me us urban folk who have taken so

much from the planet

that today our air is polluted our water

is contaminated

and our food is devoid of any nutrients

it is time for us to give back if not

for the planet then for us ourselves

and for our own survival for if you

don’t have nutrient-filled food to eat

clean air to breathe and fresh water to

drink

what kind of a life are we leading

anyways

so i invite you all to do something as

crazy

as what my family and i have done adopt

a piece of land

in your neighborhood in your school

outside your city

in your village restore it nurture it

and then enjoy the bounty of nature for

your lifetime

remember what steve jobs said those who

are crazy enough to think

that they can change the world are the

ones who do

thank you