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.

Vision:
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, bearing immense potential for satisfying basic human needs without compromising those of the Earth. 

Because it is relationship-oriented and highly specific to local conditions, it can be difficult to practice.  Instead of discretely selecting individual plants, 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, or between plants and other biota, along with other Permaculture-centric characteristics.  Knowledge of such relationships is critical to the practice of Permaculture design, our understanding of ecological processes, our capacity for systems thinking.  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 for the cross-pollination of information.  PIW itself mimics a natural system, harvesting vital resources – in this case valuable information – and distributing them appropriately.

PIW will also mimic a natural system in its informational architecture – both in terms of how the information is presented (frontend), and how it is organized and stored (backend).  The user interface will present information about interrelationships in a web-like manner, encouraging users to think in terms of connections and networks 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 facilitate 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 website, but the content 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…