Permaculture booming in Nepal After 6 years of steady work, the Jajarkot Permaculture Programme (JPP), in the mid-western Himalayan Hills of Nepal, grew from one acre of land to over fifty villages in four districts, employing some 120 staff and having 12,000 members. Chris Evans, designer, advisor and teacher to this programme, shows us that, in Nepal, permaculture has become a mature innovative approach to participatory community based development of sustainable land use. The idea of permaculture was first introduced to Nepal in 1986 when its co-founder, Bill Mollison, was invited by local development organisations to run a design course. Since than many permaculture workshops have been held and permaculture is a common term for all kinds of activities in the development of sustainable farming in Nepal. In Nepal, 91-93% of the working population is dependent on agriculture for their basic livelihood. Agricultural practices around Jajarkot have developed to be finely in tune with local mountain climates, landscape and people's needs. Such practices are intimately interwoven with the forest and other natural resources to maintain the balance of nutrients necessary to support agriculture and thus provide food, fuel, leave fodder, timber, medicines and other basic needs. Nationalisation of the forest, population growth and inappropriate programmes have combined to undermine the sustainability of traditional agriculture in a number of ways. Clearing forest land for farming, in an attempt to increase crop yields, has led to degradation of the very resources needed to support agriculture, and thus culture itself. The people of Nepal are now faced with the need to integrate forestry into agriculture in order to supply the resources they need for farming and other basic needs. In Nepal, and Jajarkot is no exception, political and social effects of the move towards a market-oriented economy are combined with corruption from both the oppressive regimes of past decades and from the present inappropriate and unethical aid policies which promote high external input activities. The result is a disempowered people with inequitable access not only to basic needs but also to the products of the market economy - consumer and luxury goods - which people assume to be without is a sign of poverty. The Jajarkot Permaculture Programme The Jajarkot Permaculture Programme (JPP), a relatively small local organisation in mid-west Nepal, has developed demonstration sites to show how sustainable agriculture can be practised by implementing good farm design and social programmes. Integration of trees, use of all farm land, improvement and utilisation of common property resources, and using techniques of low external input, provide the resources needed to increase crop yields without clearing new land. The JPP is involved in training programmes for fruit and vegetable production, beekeeping, weaving, low-external-input techniques and drinking water systems. This is producing a diverse skills base, and the JPP is further identifying and utilising traditional farming, labour and product exchange systems to apply its work. Further, in order to strengthen the local economy, marketing of farm produce is recycling wealth back into the villages. The JPP's results to date are so encouraging that part of its work is to apply and teach models of permaculture on a national and even international scale. The technologies it has introduced and taught to farmers were taken up where useful and adapted and improved by farmers themselves. The programme, in turn, took up these improvements in an information-cycle that continuously feeds back and strives to improve itself, providing a better service to user groups. After seven years struggling with a more of less top down approach, in 1995 the first real farmers' design course was organised. where farmers worked with farmers on permaculture design. Farmer to farmer Farmers who had already established and maintained new technologies could explain their experiences to the course participants visiting their farms. In one household, eight new technologies were found in its traditional farming system: fuel efficient stove; compost making; collection of daily house sweepings into a trench for nutrient recycling; liquid manure production; vegetable production in a kitchen garden; a home nursery; agroforestry planting of multi-purpose trees on field and terrace edges, and green manure’s used in rice cultivation. This farmer stated: "I use less fuel, have better meals, few pests in the garden, visit the forest less because there is more fodder and fuel coming from my land and best of all, my rice production has increased from ten to twelve hundred KGs without any extra costs." Agroforestry good for lazy farmers The JPP's Gumi Resource Centre records show that about 75% of the fodder needs for three bulls, a cow with calf and two goats are met by the Agroforestry (AF) system on the farm and 100% of the firewood needs are now being met. Fuel from Sesbania seed plants alone gave 500 KGs. A farmer in Gumi has introduced sorghum as a green manure, ploughed in after a month's growth and prior to planting potatoes. He claimed a 300% increase in potato yield compared to the non-use of sorghum. A surprise quality evaluation came not from a farmer but from a rice mill owner, who claimed that rice grown with green manure’s gave a 10% higher portion of grain to husk "a fat juicy grain which de-husks easily compared to rice grown with urea which is all husk" was his remark. Rolling permaculture The above examples of increased production were all attained without a drop in yield, which would be unacceptable in this community where agriculture is the primary source of livelihood. New systems are introduced alongside traditional ones, and are designed to enhance and diversify production rather than replace it. The second way of rolling permaculture is to use traditional methods of extension and outreach to disseminate an understanding and acceptance of improved techniques to as many people as possible. An example is sharecropping type of system of labour and product exchange called "adhiya"(adha means half). This involves a landless tenant farming the land of an absentee landlord and then receiving half the crop plus the following year's seed requirement. JPP has made adhiya contracts with local farmers and so has access to land in order to demonstrate rolling permaculture. In the same way a fruit plantation was established into which fodder trees and grasses were integrated. JPP used its resources of seed, seedlings and information to contract the species-selection, establishment and management of the orchard. Fruit is valuable for nutrition, income generation and as a low maintenance value production system. Permaculture emphasised perennial forms of agriculture, ideally from trees, hence the promotion of fruit trees in combination with other crops. JPP's technical approach Since highly appropriate traditional cropping systems (TCS) exist in Jajarkot, research concentrates on finding niches in time and space in which enhancing systems, such as green manure’s, can be added without affecting TCS yield. An example is planting mustard (a phosphate accumulator) or fenugreek (Trigonella, a nitrogen accumulator) into winter wheat shortly before harvesting the wheat in spring. When the next crop (usually maize or rice) is about to be planted, the green manure is mulched or incorporated into the soil, and the nutrients it has accumulated will be available to the next crop. In a different approach alfalfa (Lucerne) is introduced in the fallow period after millet. The adhiya approach has greatly facilitated these improvements. Revitalising traditions The JPP's philosophy is that culture, farming, economy and environment are inexorably interconnected, and losing the balance in one, means weakening the others. It thus strives to demonstrate that all three can be mutually strengthened with a mix of local resources, new appropriate technologies and an emphasis on traditional wisdom, the best available local resource. The latter of course has to include the skills of dance, song and story telling. In this way local traditions can be given new vitality. Conclusions The process of development is a long one, where one hopes that constant evaluation of progress will lead to adaptation of techniques and approaches to optimise efficiency. This does not mean maximising the "speed" of development. There are too many examples of projects that have left more harm than good in the wake of high input technology and short term benefits, which largely ignore traditional practices, are of too large a scale, and often only pursue monoculture goals. The "sharp end" of development activities should be to leave behind an infrastructure of improved local resources, skills, environment and economy, which the local people can build upon in a self determined way. In the JPP's case the "sharp end" activities are training and skill development, social work and motivation through participation. An appropriate "tool box" of technology based on local needs is then implemented by working within local traditions and cultural activities and beliefs, such as festivals, labour exchange practices, and a language based on (in Nepal) the vedic script (a Hindi/Sanskrit translation of permaculture is Grihasthashram). The results of developing such an approach is evident, with high participation in the programme by villagers across a range of ethnic and social groups. Chris Evans, Technical Advisor JPP, PO Box 10908, Kathmandu, Nepal. References - Grihasthashram Newsletter, Jajarkot Permaculture Programme, PO Box 10908, Kathmandu, Nepal. 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