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My guest today is Allen Clements, a permaculture practitioner who, when we recorded this interview in January, 2020, was completing his certification in Biodynamic Agriculture at the Pfeiffer Center in Spring Valley, New York.

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Today’s interview was originally recorded by the Australian podcaster Dan Palmer for an episode of his excellent, Making Permaculture Stronger. I’ve known Dan since before he started his show and as I recall it was at 1 or 2 AM on the East Coast of the United States when we connected over Skype several years ago to talk about his plans for starting a new podcast with a deep focus on the design process as it applies to permaculture, and what we can learn from experts within and without the community.

As my focus over the years has been on the breadth of what it means to practice permaculture, and not the specifics of design, I shared with Dan my thoughts on how to develop an interview style and choosing how much to prepare for those conversations ahead of time. How to find your narrative voice and make decisions early on that establish your on-air presentation.

After a rather enjoyable chat that ended as I could stay awake no longer and he needed to head to his evening meal, I’ve continued to follow Dan’s show over the years and find my own inspiration in him taking on the vital subject of design. With this admiration, I jumped at the opportunity when he recently reached out to ask if I’d want to share an interview he’d recorded with the founder of Holistic Management.

Needing little introduction, the Zimbabwean ecologist Allan Savory has spent decades developing and refining how we can manage complexity in the environment, on our farms, and in our lives. In a forward-thinking approach that walks us backward from the vision of how we want our world, land, or life to be, we can then look well beyond the moment and see where we want to go and how to get there

This is, of course, a simplified explanation of a fascinating and deep system for managing a wide range of issues, but which has roots in fighting desertification and reversing climate change.

You can find more about Allan and his work at Savory.global

Dan’s website and podcast are at makingpermaculturestronger.net.

You can read Dan's original show notes at: https://makingpermaculturestronger.net/permaculture-holistic-management/

Leaving this interview what Allan said about our ability to manage complexity stuck in my mind, and so I immediately picked up a copy of the audiobook of Holistic Management, Third Edition, A Commonsense Revolution to Restore Our Environment. What stood out both in the book and from this conversation is how Allan turns the language of complexity around so that we do not have to name what we face, but rather focus on the desired outcomes of our holistic context while allowing us to quickly grasp what we need to do to achieve that end. Along the way we have checks to see whether or not what we’re doing is correct for reaching that long-term holistic context.

Why this stood out to me was that in my graduate program years ago, we used to break complex situations down into two main categories: issues and problems. Issues were the overarching conditions leading to detrimental effects which cannot be directly addressed through a simple on-the-ground action or small policy change. Problems were individual pieces we could create a plan or policy around and thus change. The issues we found drove what problems we could solve, thus ameliorating the impacts of the larger issues. Work on enough problems, the theory went, and eventually, you’d solve the issue.

As I understand what Allan’s doing, Holistic Management takes all of that, wraps it up in one process, and allows us to continuously work on both the issues and problems in parallel. Though I know there’s much more to the method than my words here express, there exists a tangible power behind Holistic Management to achieve a beautiful, bountiful world where we’ve afforested the deserts and reversed climate change.

But, those are just my thoughts at the moment. What are yours?

Leave a comment in the show notes, or send me an email: The Permaculture Podcast

A few updates and announcements:

One of those, as we approach the 10th anniversary of the podcast, is the annual Summer to Fall fundraiser.

My goal for this fundraiser is two-fold. The first is to upgrade the computer where I edit the show. The second is to invest in some video equipment to record video interviews and site tours once the world recovers from COVID.

To go along with the fundraiser, for anyone donating $50 or more (please include postage, international listeners), if you include your address in the notes for your donation, I’ll send you a USB drive with every currently available interview, monologue, and discussion from the first decade of The Permaculture Podcast. That includes the first show from 2010 all the way up to the 10th-anniversary episode out on October 10th of this year.

Also, I’m here to help you find the resources necessary to bring your vision of permaculture into the world. You can now schedule a one-on-one consultation with me, or a more casual, meandering conversation if you prefer, at calendly.com/permaculture.

Finally, there are more voices in the world doing amazing work than I could ever have the possibility to record an interview with, so if you’ve ever thought, “I’d love to hear an interview with a member of my community on The Permaculture Podcast,” now’s the opportunity. I’d like to teach you how to record a conversation and send it to me to share on the show. You don’t need to edit or produce the interview, I’ll take care of all that.

I’m also particularly interested in stories recorded by women and young people and from Black, Indigenous, and People of Color communities.

If you’re interested, let me know. Send an email to: The Permaculture Podcast with the subject, “My Community” and pitch me the story you’d like to share.

Until the next time, spend each day managing complexity, while taking care of Earth, your self, and each other.

Visit Our Sponsor: Foraged.Market

Donate Directly: via PayPal -or- Venmo @permaculturepodcast

Want to listen to more conversations about Permaculture? 

Today’s interview was originally recorded by the Australian podcaster Dan Palmer for an episode of his excellent, Making Permaculture Stronger. I’ve known Dan since before he started his show and as I recall it was at 1 or 2 AM on the East Coast of the United States when we connected over Skype several years ago to talk about his plans for starting a new podcast with a deep focus on the design process as it applies to permaculture, and what we can learn from experts within and without the community.

Learn More

Online: via PayPal

Venmo: @permaculturepodcast

My guest today is John Kempf, the author of the recently released Quality Agriculture.  A farmer, teacher, and entrepreneur from Northeast, Ohio, John has spent more than 15 years developing a nutrition and farm management program that quickly restores soil health and maximizes plant resistance to disease and insects, while reducing costs and increasing profits for farmers who adopt these methods. Already applying these processes to millions of acres of farmland, his current mission is for these regenerative models to become adopted globally by 2040.

Along the way, John shares the history of how he came to and developed these methods, as well as how existing food policies and intellectual property systems hamper farmers' ability to steward the land and increase the health and resilience of our communities. By holistically meeting the needs of farmers and focusing on the results, rather than the methods, John leads farmers down the path of regenerative agriculture and a more abundant future.

Find out more about John, his podcast, and his new book, Quality Agriculture, at JohnKempf.com.

Become a sustaining supporter at Patreon

John's results represent what permaculture practitioners can achieve on a broad-scale by seeing to farmers' needs while speaking the language of permaculture. John is doing for fruit and vegetable agriculture what folks like Allan Savory are achieving raising animals.

Permaculture folks have a fantastic number of tools in our toolkit. John extends those by providing a model for furthering our practices, whether we are interested in working directly with farmers and broad-scale agriculture or policy and politics. We can use the research and science he's found to argue and advocate for practices and procedures that change agriculture as we know it. We can push organic and other operations further and further away from chemical use and closer to what we've known for more than 40 years: working with nature leads to bountiful results.

But, those are just my thoughts at the moment. What are yours? 

Leave a comment below in the show notes or by sending me an email: The Permaculture Podcast

Resources

Visit Our Sponsor: Foraged.Market

Donate Directly: via PayPal -or- Venmo @permaculturepodcast

Want to listen to more conversations about Permaculture? 

My guest today is John Kempf, the author of the recently released Quality Agriculture.  A farmer, teacher, and entrepreneur from Northeast, Ohio, John has spent more than 15 years developing a nutrition and farm management program that quickly restores soil health and maximizes plant resistance to disease and insects, while reducing costs and increasing profits for farmers who adopt these methods. Already applying these processes to millions of acres of farmland, his current mission is for these regenerative models to become adopted globally by 2040.

Learn More

Online: via PayPal

Venmo: @permaculturepodcast

My guest today is Laura Oldanie, a permaculture practitioner and the author behind the website Rich and Resilient Living, which focuses on how we can live a life and make financial decisions that lead to a regenerative future.

Laura joins me as a sort of continuation of the conversation with Erin Axelrod, but focusing on the individual rather than the organization. During our time together Laura shares how we can make a difference by considering where our money sleeps. The ways to guide our finances towards banking and investment so our surplus provides benefits for our local communities. How non-financial capital can create an abundance. Throughout it all, we also remember, that the world we live in, and our lives right now, are in a period of transition so we can be gentle on ourselves and our decisions.

Related Interviews

Visit Our Sponsor: Foraged.Market

Donate Directly: via PayPal -or- Venmo @permaculturepodcast

Want to listen to more conversations about Permaculture? 

My guest today is Laura Oldanie, a permaculture practitioner and the author behind the website Rich and Resilient Living, which focuses on how we can live a life and make financial decisions that lead to a regenerative future.

Learn More

Online: via PayPal

Venmo: @permaculturepodcast

My guest today is Owen Wormser. Owen is a sustainable landscape designer from Western Massachusetts and author of Lawns into Meadows: Growing a Regenerative Landscape, from Stonepier Press.

This specialty in landscapes forms our conversation today as we discuss his design process of creating meadows. This includes:

• Using nurse crops for establishing a meadow.

Find out more about him and his work at AboundDesign.com, and his book, Lawns into Meadows, at stonepierpress.org.

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As permaculture practitioners, establishing meadows can form an important part of our design toolkit. We can leave an area barren, but intentionally tended around, and allow the seed bank to grow up and select from the species that arise as the base for a meadow, or what to leave intact as we establish a food forest or design around for our garden paths. In areas with restrictive covenants on trees and tree heights, or in towns with weed ordinances, meadows can be a beautiful way to restore the landscape while skirting those restrictions. If we live along waterways or as farmers trying to reduce the total daily load from runoff and fertilizer, and to reduce topsoil losses, buffer strips of meadows along our streams and rivers can improve water conditions while saving our earth.

But, those are just my thoughts on meadows at the moment. What are yours?

Get in touch by leaving a comment below or sending me an email: The Permaculture Podcast

Until the next time, spend each day restoring the landscape and establishing meadows, while taking care of Earth, yourself, and each other.

Resources

Abound Design

Lawns into Meadows

Pollinator Pathways

Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation

Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center

Wild Ones Native Plants, Natural Landscapes