As we embody our values and live ever differently, how do we change the
communities we are a part of as we become ever more apart from them?
This is one of many thoughts I have as we enter this conversation with Kai
Sawyer, as we look at his life as a practitioner embracing peace,
permaculture, and the gift economy to bring about social and cultural
change in Japan.
Something Kai wanted me to mention, that didn’t make it into our
conversation is the ongoing impact and questions as a result of the
Fukushima Daiichi power plant meltdown.
Something I didn’t know, that Kai shared in his follow-up email, is that
Fukushima prefecture was one of the leading organic food growing regions in
Japan.
What happens then, to the organic or natural farmer who carefully and with
a lot of love, grew beautiful soil for decades that is now contaminated
with cesium 134 and 137? Who will buy their produce? Who will help them
rebuild their entire life?
Also in Fukushima prefecture was an innovative permaculture project at Iitate
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iitate,_Fukushima>village that sought to
redesign the community using permaculture to reverse the process of rural
depopulation, to keep residents in this rural location rather than heading
to the cities.
To Kai’s knowledge, it is the only initiative of the kind in Japan, one
where an entire village was a permaculture design site. As you might
imagine, the proximity to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant and the
ways the wind blew, high levels of radiation fell on the village, and their
entire village was evacuated by the government.
A project to preserve the community, destroyed by a single disaster,
responded to with modern practices now so ingrained they seem traditional
and the only path forward.
How could this situation have been different if more communities in Japan
were transformed by the whole systems design of permaculture and a chance
to the cultural and social structures and consciousness?
As we grow as practitioners, how can we change these ways of thinking and
organizing in our own communities and, in turn, change the way they are
governed and inhabited?
If you have thoughts on this or anything else Kai and I spoke about, I’d
love to hear from you.
*Subscribe to Permaculture Magazine, North America
<https://permaculturemag.org/>*
Receive a 25% discount on a *digital subscription* with the code:
*PMNA25TPP*