My proposal for permaculturists interested
in working in aid to do some voluntary work (or paid work, if they can get it
- we need more people to be paid for their permaculture work so that it
becomes integrated into their lives and income stream) with aid agencies in
their own country was to enlarge their skills and to provide insight into the
aid industry, the limitations that aid agencies receiving government or other
donor funding in developed countries work under and how the agencies respond
to the needs of their partners in developing countries.
Yes, that is one very important
function,. But I also suggest that bringing the multi-disciplinary tools
of Permaculture into the aid agencies could help these go in the
direction that they are trying to go, out of the neo-colonialist top-down
approach to a facilitative function of local
realitites.
As to documentation, I would ask what
do we actually document in Permaculture
This is the difficult part, isn't it?
In this vein, I thought Sharon´s suggestion
really interesting: how many of the total necessities are being furnished by
the farm. This kind of survey before and after ( allowing a space of some
years!) could be a very interesting way of testing the effectiveness of
sustainable farming programs, something that might not be measured by other
ouputs,and I would also like to thank her contribution, which was a great
insight.
Marsha
