Doing our daily business, we might not think about it much using our so-called sophisticated water closets which cost thousands of dollars to maintain and waste millions of litres of fresh water daily.
People in a refugee camp aren’t that lucky. Doing their business can often be very dangerous, especially for women. The pollution created is also a big problem and so are unsanitary toilet compounds that can’t deal with the volume. There are no pipes or costly sewer systems.
Jay Abraham from Biologic Design in the UK has coined the phrase ‘tree bog’ for the toilet system that simply uses an old essential habit that people in his native England used daily. As he describes ‘People used to do their business in a bucket in a closet and they would have a separate bucket of soil and sprinkle it over each time a deposit was made. It kept the smell away.”
Tree bog infographic byAndrew Jeeves (Regrarians)
The way the tree bog works is quite similar. Its floor is built up high, at least 1.5 metres above ground level. The space under the floor is enclosed by 2 layers of wire mesh filled with carbon material (hay, straw, dry grasses) to allow air flow, absorb excess nitrogen and provide a visual barrier. The human waste is covered with sawdust, ash or soil and breaks down, feeding the surrounding area that’s planted out with trees, grasses and ground covers. In less than a year there are fast growing trees & fruits such as papaya to pick plus shade and biomass to refill the wire mesh carbon wall.
For 30 years Jay has been using his tree bog invention on his own property, fine tuning it to be shared with the world. He’s supported many projects that are building the toilets in refugee camps.
Permafund has recently funded a tree bog in the Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya. Established in 1990, the camp has some 60 000 inhabitants with many living there in limbo for years and years.
Since then, Marcelin Munga from Food & Health Education (FHE) in Kakuma has attracted more funding to build another tree bog. Members of the Permafund team were invited to tune into a live Zoom workshop with Jay Abraham beamed in from the UK. Marcelin hosted some 20 people from the compound including 3 cooks and 2 educators and a number of mothers with their babies, eager to start building their own tree bog. The workshop members used tools previously purchased with the Permafund grant.
There were some technical difficulties with the Zoom, but we got see the site and meet the group. Jay gave a report from another camp where one of the tree bog toilets had caught the attention of UNHCR. They inspected it with a negative attitude and the intention to knock it down but instead left impressed and gave the tree bog their tick of approval.
Donations made to Permaculture Australia’s Permafund that are over $2,00 are tax deductible in Australia and are supporting the grant program that assists organisations like Farm and Health Education to make a significant, practical difference in their community through the application of permaculture design principles and ethics.
He was tireless in his service to, and ‘needling of’ permaculture and its design process. Dan is sadly missed as a fearless questioner, a passionate connector, and strong and fragile a spirit as the living systems he loved.
Donations of support for his young family can be made at GO FUND ME
If you, or if someone you know is struggling with mental health, don’t wait – get help now. Talk to a friend, reach out and visit to Beyond Blue
Supporting capacity building and the establishment of permaculture food gardens to improve nutrition and a place to demonstrate and learn.
Introduction to permaculture workshop in a demonstration permaculture garden, Kambiri Kenya
Introduction: Thank you to Permafund and all those who contribute to it, for supporting programs that help vulnerable women and children in East Africa with a $1,000 grant.
In December 2018, I was invited to Uganda and Kenya by small community-based organisations to support local permaculture education programs particularly with women and children. I went as a volunteer and took my two eldest children, Maia and Hugh (then 12 and 10). As well as being helpers along the way, they also graduated with their PDCs from the course held at the Sabina Primary School led by young people from Uganda, Kenya and Liberia. The core goal of this course was to teach teachers.
(Note: As volunteers, my children & I paid for all our expenses & received no payment for our work.)
My children meeting the women’s self-help group leaders who are sharing permaculture in the local village and schools
Goal: The overall goal of this project was to enable communities to vision, design, implement and manage permaculture food gardens for education, food security, and sustainable livelihood capacity-building.
The project: The funds donated by Permafund were spent on helping to develop the practical land-based centres for learning about permaculture at two main locations.
A: Sabina School, near Rakai, south west Uganda
The school at Sabina is important for a number of reasons.
It is a place of learning for hundreds of local children
It is a becoming a teaching garden for permaculture teachers
It is becoming a teaching garden for school teachers
The funds were used to buy tools, fruit trees, seeds, building materials for compost systems, animal enclosures and animals, and provide educational materials.
This school was also the site of permaculture design course in December 2018 followed by local farmer training and local school teacher training programs.
The ongoing management of the project is the responsibility of the school, with the permaculture trained teachers and school students who attended training. A local permaculture organisation, BEU Permaculture is regularly checking in with progress.
Children at Sabina School learning permaculture with my children.
B: Women’s Self-help Group, Kambiri Village, Kakamega, Kenya
This region of Kenya is experiencing prolonged drought and the women have come together to find solutions. Permaculture makes good sense to them. Through additional crowdfunding, Ethos Foundation sponsored 5 people from this region to attend permaculture design courses at Sabina School in Uganda.
In December 2018 in Kambiri I offered an introduction to permaculture workshop and undertook an assessment of the area to understand the needs for developing a permaculture education centre. During this introductory workshop we undertook a collaborative process and drafted a design for the demonstration gardens. We also helped start a seed-exchange program.
The demonstration gardens are now being developed and a Permaculture Design Course was held in August 2019. Participants of the PDC were mostly women and they have returned to their communities to share permaculture design ideas and strategies.
Jane Amunga – the initiator of the Women’s Self Help group at Kambiri.
The Women’s Self-Help group leaders, Kambiri Kenya in their permaculture demonstration garden
The Permafund funds were used to purchase a water tank and seeds, set up for the permaculture training, pay a local translator and distribute educational materials.
Ethos sponsored four local leaders to complete their PDC in Sabina School, Uganda – principal, agriculture extension worker, support worker for girls health, disability advocate. These people are now teaching locally and supported the Women’s group PDC in August 2019.
Permaculture and the government: It’s also interesting to note that while in Uganda, we met with the East African Minister for Agriculture and the Ugandan Minister for Education, as well a number of local and regional officials. All of them are very keen to see permaculture developed further in the region. One particularly interesting discussion was around having permaculture taught in university to teachers, and there being a series of schools around Uganda where teachers could go and learn in-situ. It was identified that support was welcomed in helping to develop curriculum and teaching those who can lead such programs in university.
Meeting with the Minister for Education at her home in Uganda.
Permaculture and the refugee council: Also interesting to note is the community resilience work of the Danish Refugee Council, particularly that of Natalie Topa, in her role of Resilience Officer. I spent some time with her in Nairobi and was delighted to hear about how much her work is based on permaculture throughout East Africa and Yemen.
Natalie Topa with Morag Gamble in Nairobi. Natalie Topa works with the Danish Refugee Council and implements permaculture throughout her work.
Ongoing: Ethos Foundation is continuing to provide some additional support for the development of these gardens and is dedicated to sponsoring permaculture education programs that will help people implement and manage more of these types of local permaculture demonstration gardens. The aim is to create a network of permaculture gardens in local communities – places to learn, to demonstrate, to access resources and connect with others wanting positive change.
Impact: Several gardens have been renewed and/or established where people can come to learn about permaculture. Gardens and systems are developing for the seeds and plant materials to be freely exchanged. New networks of local permaculture teachers are being established.
About Ethos Foundation: The Ethos Foundation, a sister organisation to the Permaculture Education Institute, is a small registered permaculture charity dedicated to:
supporting the spread of permaculture education through practical community-based projects led by local people to address local needs in their local communities
mentoring, enabling and supporting local permaculture leaders and educators
providing micro grants to local projects to access the resources needed to implement sustainable food garden initiatives.
A sincere thanks again to Permafund for supporting these communities. I encourage you to continue donating to Permafund. The difference that can be made with a small amount of resourcing is quite phenomenal.
Report by Morag Gamble, Executive Director (volunteer), Ethos Foundation
Permafund is managed by Permaculture Australia and provides small grants to communities in Australia and internationally. Donations over $2 are tax deductible and are accepted as ‘one off’ or recurring donations. Find out more including how to donate here: https://permacultureaustralia.org.au/permafund/donating-to-permafund-is-easy/
The Permafund team has received a positive mid-term progress report from the Kiini Sustainable Initiative based in Nyeri, Kenya. Following their receipt of an AU$2,000 micro grant in 2018, they’ve reported that the overall project is progressing well in terms of accomplishing their objectives and adhering to their February to November 2019 timeline.
In a community where farmland and the environment have been degraded and natural resources like rainwater are being under-utilised, the project has aimed to encourage the wise use of resources to improve community food security and overall productivity.
Students from the Nyeri Farm View Academy learning about compost making
Deforestation, over-cultivation of farmland, loss of topsoil through water and wind erosion, indiscriminate use of insecticides and inorganic fertilisers, loss of biodiversity and pollinators have inspired the Kiini Sustainable Initiative to introduce permaculture education and activities as tools for change.
Through education about permaculture principles the Initiative’s goal is to inspire attitude change and transformative thinking in the community to better use their natural and human resources to: –
harvest water and improve water quality
improve land management practices
reduce erosion
increasing biodiversity and
restore the environment
On site permaculture solutions have included the installation of water tanks on homes to harvest roof run-off for domestic use and irrigation of food crops, construction of a simple water recycling system including grey water collection and terracing to slow erosion allow improvement of the soil.
A simple grey water recycling system
At the Nyeri Farm View Academy children are learning about permaculture through the creation of a kitchen garden assisted by teachers, parents and the community. Other schools in the area are interested in the project which could expand if more funding support becomes available.
Junior students visiting new gardens
The Kiini Sustainable Initiative is optimistic the project will achieve its objectives despite the challenges of drought conditions, the proliferation of pests due to the high temperatures and the slow adoption of permaculture principles among some community members.
My permaculture journey started way back before my consciousness of what permaculture is – began.
At my Nana’s knee in fact. My grandmother was a classic Depression gardener. Everything left over, spare and not needed went into her garden.
As a child, I delighted at the treasure trove of goodies to be found whilst digging in the sandy soil of her seaside garden. Oyster shells, tea leaves, rusty iron bars, paper and newspapers, old toys, bits of brick and lawn clippings … a veritable ocean of lawn clippings!
She would go on evening walks around her suburb snipping a cutting here and there which had made its way over the fence of some unsuspecting neighbour. That time-honoured tradition of what’s hanging over the fence is fair game, still exists today I am sure, but for Nanna it was a fait accompli.
Hers was a large urban block of some 1200 square metres, with garden all around the perimeter and a large soft rolling couch lawn in the middle. A mature date palm edged with a circle of liver-coloured bricks sat just near the Hills hoist, waving its fronds in the sea breeze. A man would come every year and collect seed from that tree and I’m sure half the date palms in Australia are related to that one, such was the abundance of seed it produced.
Certain habits were a ritual, such as tipping the tea leaves from the pot each day over the Christmas bush that sat at the back stairs or procuring manure for the lemon tree down the back with the cover crop of strawberries underneath.
Her habits must have been catching because I can recall family tales of her daughter (my aunt) growing garlic under the roses in the front yard of her home in a very conservative Australian country town. Yes, it was companion planting. It wasn’t quite the scandal, but almost!
Years later I can recall papering my entire front yard with newspapers to suppress weeds and old grass, much to the neighbour’s surprise – before laying a new lawn.
It worked a treat. I had the best lawn in the street bar none!
A few years later I heard a story on the radio about two Australians who had invented a new way of growing food called permaculture. Bill Mollison and David Holmgren inspired me to plant a large vegetable garden and fruit trees.
The ground was hard packed clay and the climate was cold and frosty, so results were mixed. And I had my losses, birds devoured the grapes as soon as they ripened, and the dog got into the rockmelon patch and chewed through every piece of ripe fruit. But the chillies grew amazingly well, as did the cherry tomatoes. I was hooked.
Next, I moved to a windy, salty beach side suburb where everything seemed to struggle. I persevered. And bit by bit success came. I composted, I wrapped young trees in hessian against the wind, I watered constantly from the bore under my backyard – the citrus, passionfruit and a mango did well. Even the bananas fruited under my watchful eye aided by a liberal dose of coffee grounds donated by a local barista. A good crop of tamarillos one year encouraged me to order a few sub-tropicals from Daley’s to try.
They hated the salty winds and one by one they turned up their toes. The vegetables were woeful. Nothing liked the black acid soils. It was very discouraging.
The neighbours were discouraging too. They loved their lawn monocultures, devoid of any trees or shrubs.
Each February when the heat hit, the whole suburb would brown off, except my little patch of green, with its fruit trees, gingers and tiger grasses framing a lawn longer than what was fashionable, with chooks pecking around at the edges.
One day I asked myself… “Am I the weirdo here?” It was then I knew it was time to move. I simply didn’t fit anymore. I wanted to be somewhere where people gave a damn about their environment, where when the topic of soil came up, their eyes didn’t glaze over and where everybody knew what a swale was and what it was for.
At the time I was working as a journalist for a metropolitan newspaper. It was long hours, inside at a computer. I lived for the weekends when I could go to the garden. I am not religious, but that garden was my church. It fed my body and my spirit.
So, when redundancies were offered, I thought long and hard about my life, and then put up my hand.
I decided I was going to study permaculture. But before I left, I left my readers a legacy, a feature story on a local permaculture couple, Mark Brown and Kate Beveridge of Purple Pear Farm.
A visit to study their setup and systems convinced me I was doing the right thing. An intensive deep dive into Geoff Lawton’s amazing videos following that, had me enthralled.
I enrolled in the Diploma of Permaculture with the National Environment Centre at Albury TAFE under head teacher, Sue Brunskill.
From the very first, a new world unfolded. What was to follow was three immersive semesters of project-based study with supportive and knowledgeable teachers. Along the way, I moved again, this time to the Northern Rivers area of NSW where I supplemented my Diploma studies with additional training at the Permaculture College of Australia with permaculture pioneer, Robyn Francis.
Again, I was amazed by how much support and knowledge Robyn gave me, offering me the use of her extensive library at any time with which to complete my diploma studies.
While I was doing my diploma, I completed several courses with Robyn including Advanced Design Skills and Teacher Training.
I met incredible people through my studies and learned so much that I could apply in my own life.
Today a few years on, I am doing permaculture on an old gravel quarry and I work as a country real estate agent in a village where permaculture is as normal as breathing. I even list and sell properties in a dedicated permaculture community.
My gravel quarry is coming along nicely and while it has a long way to go, I would say if permaculture can work on a gravel quarry, or green a desert – it truly can work anywhere!
I have been able to pair my work and my study together beautifully, because now I can read a landscape easily, understand and design water systems effortlessly, assess issues by the weeds that grow there and along the way, sprinkle my clients with a healthy little dose of permaculture!
It’s my way of giving a bit back to the discipline which has given to me so much already.
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