Homepage: Welcome to the Permaculture Information Web, a growing resource of Permaculture information created by and for the people who use it.  

Mission: The Permaculture Information Web offers information about the relationships between biota – including plants, animals, microorganisms, and other elements of living systems – in order to assist with the process of Permaculture design.

"Permaculture is a form of whole systems design based on the sustainability of natural systems.  It seeks to create sustainability in the human living environment, and is applicable to all realms of design.  Permaculture is modular and applicable to any bioregion, and bears immense potential for satisfying basic human needs without compromising those of the Earth.  Because it is relationship-oriented and highly specific to local conditions, though, it can be difficult to practice.  Instead of discretely selecting individual plants, for instance, relationships between biota must be woven together carefully, in consideration of a plant’s relationships to fellow organisms, to the overall ecosystem, and to the people whose needs it may satisfy.  Although numerous databases offer information about individual plants, none offer information about the relationships between plants themselves or between plants and other biota, along with Permaculture-centric characteristics such as inputs, outputs, and multiple functions.  Knowledge of such relationships is critical to the practice of Permaculture design, our understanding of ecological processes, and ultimately, our capacity for systems thinking.  Accordingly, the Permaculture Information Web will provide an online database of relationships between biota, to facilitate the process of Permaculture design.  

People practicing Permaculture worldwide are discovering relevant and useful information about plant relationships.  But, because Permaculture as a field is somewhat un-institutionalized, no central repository for collecting and presenting such information exists.  PIW seeks to help fill this void, providing an infrastructure from and to which the Permaculture community may glean and contribute information.  In this way, PIW will itself mimic a natural system, harvesting vital resources, in this case valuable information, and distributing it in an appropriate manner.  

Parallel to the manner in which Permaculture mimics ecological principles in its design methodology, the PIW will mimic these principles in its own information architecture – both in terms of how the information is presented, and how it is organized and stored.  The user interface will present information about webs of life in a web-like manner, encouraging users to think in terms of relationships versus individual components.  Similarly, the backend component will draw upon Ecosystem Information Engineering, a branch of Industrial Ecology applying ecological principles to the design of information systems.  Simply put, the message will match the medium, and the medium will foster a more meaningful understanding of the message.  

The Permaculture Information Web is created by and for the members of the Permaculture Community.  The PIW team is constructing and maintaining the mechanism for cross-pollinating information, but the information itself will be contributed by you – interested parties at the grassroots level.  In attempt to manifest Permaculture principles in its own design and function within the Permaculture field, the PIW hopes to act as a dynamic organism, co-evolving with the needs and preferences of the Permaculture community, and grow with the information imparted by its members.  The PIW team hopes you will both feed from and nourish this fertile resource…