pcplantdb

["Lawrence F. London, Jr." <lfl@intrex.net>]

John Schinnerer wrote:

> Infiltrating USDA activities with Permaculture is a great idea.  No 

It has already been infiltrated, they alread know about permaculture and use 
it.
What they need is what we can offer, PIW.

> objection there.
> I don't know if or how much it has been worked on - Scott, Lawrence, any 
> info on that?

Cooperative Extension is like a large unweildy ship with built in pecking 
order
among the administrative heirarchy. It needs to turn in the direction of
sustainable agriculture, permaculture, organics, renewables, local food 
production
but that is a slow process. In NC it used to be locked up by the supporting 
land grant college
system and promoted nothing other than chemical, conventional ag. It even 
used to be illegal
to sell bagged organic fertilizer in NC. The ship has finally made a change 
of direction
for the most part. Organic farming-oriented agents are in much greater number 
now and are
scattered over the state with a greater concentration in the Central Piedmont 
and in the Mountains.
There is a sustainable farming curriculum with a permaculture course at one 
of the community colleges.
So, yes, Extension is interested in permaculture, teaching it and promoting 
it. Steve Diver, who is on this list
and used to be an Extension agent, can tell you a lot more about this. As for 
USDA, they are already involved
with permaculture in various ways, especially as far as library resources are 
concerned. The National Agricultural
LIbrary has a collection called The Alternative Farming Systems Information 
Center; this is the group that would
likely be the most interested in PIW and might promote it widely. A SARE 
grant proposal might include establishing
a relationship between PIW and AFSIC. USDA already hosts a number of 
databases, some created by Dr. James Duke, herbalist.

Anyway, it is highly likely that Extension would be interested in 
incorporating permaculture resources in their
ongoing outreach programs. Extension has their own array of online info 
resources and individual Extension agents
mount their own websites on Extension servers, often tailored with more 
refined and cutting edge resources.
As part of this outreach they might promote all sorts of local and national 
permaculture activities, convocations and online resources
Permaculture offers tools they can use in their role of providing information 
and consultation to their client base, i.e. county taxpayers.
Online resources are part of this program; PIW is a tool and is online so it will fit perfectly in toeir outreach program. They are 
especially active in areas where small and market farming is popular; they proving a lot of organizational help and ongoing support for
farmer's markets.

> AND as far as HG goes, what you're proposing is IMO a far larger game 
> that needs far larger (or at least more!) players. Coordinating PC 
> people and USDA to make connections to get a SARE grant for trainings is 
> IMO *way way WAY* outside the scope of our HG project.

Hardly. It is exactly the kind of thing we should be doing, early on. SARE 
will help put us on the map.
If we serve a small homesteader on Jersey we can just as easily serve the 
entire USDA ccommunity of
professionals and their clients.

> Let's look for 
> simpler grant solutions for our particular project funds.

Not at all. PFAF is already a major resource, probably used by USDA people, 
maybe Extension too.
Think big, John.

> This could be a particularly heinous example of "feature creep"... ;-)
>
> An idea alongside the above:
>
> If some PC folks have relations with USDA types somewhere already, let's 

We need to help create those types of relationships all over the country;
our relationship with USDA, mostly through Extension and AFSIC, will go a 
long way toward making this happen.

> go to them about being the people who fit this grant model and see if 
> they're interested.  Then you just have to fill in the blanks instead of 
> create the whole connection from scratch.

That's not the way to go about it. We start with SARE and/or other SARE-like government agencies offering funding possibilities for 
worthwile projects that in turn further their own goals. We are offering something that _they_ as well as their clients (US taxpayers)
can use.

> In other words, IMO this is a whole 'nother project, definitely not part 
> of HG - though HG could obviously be useful to that whole 'nother 
> project were some group(s) to take it on.

This possible relationship with SARE is part and parcel of our mission as 
well as vision and something we need to pursue now, not later.
Strike while the iron is hot.

LL
--
L.F.London
lfl@intrex.net
http://market-farming.com
http://www.ibiblio.org/ecolandtech