The Power of Permaculture

Last week at school, we hosted a much-anticipated seminar on Permaculture. Now, many of you may be wondering, what the heck is that?

Permaculture nutrition is a way of living that's designed to improve human health, the health of our communities, and the health of the environments in which we live. It uses the principles of a sustainable agricultural approach known as Permaculture, and combines it with an understanding of human nutrition. With a firm understanding of both concepts, we can start to meet our needs in a manner that actually strengthens our surroundings, rather than depleting them.

The four basic Permaculture principles are as follows:
*Working with nature rather than against it
*Thoughtful observation rather than thoughtless labor
*Each element should perform many functions rather than one
*Everything is connected to everything else

Teaching Permaculture is a PEPFAR dream because it combines so many of its objectives, namely spreading nutrition education along with care for orphans and vulnerable children and people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA).

Let me introduce you to the Permaculture God, if you will, of Peace Corps Tanzania. Enter Peter Jensen (pictured on the left with translator Sommi of Tengeru Agricultural College on his right)

So, why did this guru come to implement this seminar with me and my students at GAVC? First, to educate young Tanzanians (my students) about the many benefits of sustainable agriculture and how to do it. Second, to leave a demo garden, which we created together by hand with jembes, rakes and ratos. In effect, together, we created a balanced, swaled and guilded garden to nourish and educate students, and the community at large, for years to come. That's at least the hope! Now, we await the rains (which by the way, are out of control at the moment) and the sun to do the real work.

Veni. Vidi. Vici. The result: glorious.

Our school garden now boasts corn, soya beans, aloe vera, matembele (potato leaves - full of iron), papaya seedlings, lettuce, swiss chard and chinesi (a local green). More soon on how we reached this point. In short, blood, sweat and tears. Hardly. But sweat and blood, yes! (We had an unfortunate boy sliced on the forehead by a swinging jembe, accidentally of course. Nothing a band-aid couldn't remedy, thankfully)