Job Opportunity - Project Philippines Palawan

Dears,

I'm Giordano, nice to meet you!
I would like to have the chance to talk to you and see if we can cooperate in the future in a project which we are now developing in the Philippines/Palawan.

My self and 3 other partners are starting an Eco-resort front beach using earth bags houses and only clean power; we have already purchased a land lot of 25K SQM
In the plan we would like to introduce and integrate completely as well a permaculture garden of 5K SQM, however we have only basic knowledge and limited experience, therefore we are looking for someone which could offer :

- initial training and design according to the local environment, geographical area and resort needing
- executive plan with instruction step by step
- consultancy and follow up the progress (also remotely) during the development



The vision is a fully independent and sustainable village, under all the aspects of power, waste water treatment, clean water and food, and I want to emphasize that the final purpose is not specifically related to the business aspects, but to the creation of a model to demonstrate the people the way we should be living.

The village will have about 10 cottages for guests, and 4-5 houses for the investors and the people which will be working in the village, all the main structure will be made in Adobe and earth bags.
There will be other structures as well: swimming pool, restaurant/bar, health center with gym,area for yoga and meditation, spa- sauna and massage center.

the Garden area will be located more inland (still in the same lot) and will be dedicated instead to the animals, permaculture, gardening etc. as mentioned before we were thinking about 5000sqm but we are flexible and open to do adjustment if necessary.
Some of the gardens/fruit trees and plants can be integrated with cottages and bungalow fro decoration, rather than a specific restricted area (garden), or we were thinking to add these to a living fence around the area perimeter.

So we may need to consider as long term plan in which roughly will have an AVG of 20 people with a MIN of 6 and a MAX of 30 approximately (of course this is not expected at the beginning), Therefore the goal is to have enough food for a balanced diet for everyone everyday. we were thinking to include:

- poultry e.g. chickens/turkey for both meat and eggs.
- milk (either goat/cattle/sheep), to drink and make cheese
- pigs for meat and ham
- fruit trees such as coconuts, mango, papaya, graviola, avocado, banana,
- Green and vegetables
- bees for honey
- herbs, not only to be used in the kitchen, but also for aromatherapy and essential oils

We need to ensure the sustainability not only for Eco reasons but as well because the access to any product due to remote location of the land is basically impossible or very pricy.
there is no people around and we basically isolated.

Due to our limited knowledge and to speed up the project progresses it would be easier to cooperate with an expertise and learn in parallel, that's why we posted this AD.

So we are looking someone which could design (providing all the detailed information of the land portion size necessary to obtain the quantity and the range of food above listed, equipment necessary, timeline, etc..) + provide an executive plan step by step so that we can work on the project even with limited knowledge. Then even if you are at the other side of the world, we would like to have a follow up on the progress during development (using picture, movies, remote cameras, emails), so we can learn and be guided to solve issues, with the final goal to grow our culture as well.
What we need to understand first is the feasibility of this strategy:

- is it possible for you to do this remotely? Or is a must for you to be onsite?
- which information are needed for you to be able to design properly
- which form of cooperation you would like to explore?

Please share any comments and I look forward to talk to you

Gio

Welcome to Permies, Giordano! Your plan sounds like a little piece of Paradise, I've always wanted to visit Palawan.

You are probably going to get a lot of advice from people here, even more if you post a satellite view of the property which you can lift off of Google Maps. The only thing that is hard to visualize from half-way around the world is the topography. What kind of a beach do you have, and how does the land rise from it? Are there coconut palms on the beach already? How far back from the beach is the area you are considering for the garden?

Two and a half hectares is a good sized piece of land, and you could generate a considerable amount of the food for your guests. But it is a disadvantage to be isolated. You don't want to have to depend on your harvests coming at the same time as your guests. How far are you from a town where you could sell your produce when you have more produce than guests?

John Elliott wrote:Welcome to Permies, Giordano! Your plan sounds like a little piece of Paradise, I've always wanted to visit Palawan.

You are probably going to get a lot of advice from people here, even more if you post a satellite view of the property which you can lift off of Google Maps. The only thing that is hard to visualize from half-way around the world is the topography. What kind of a beach do you have, and how does the land rise from it? Are there coconut palms on the beach already? How far back from the beach is the area you are considering for the garden?

Hi thanks a lot!
Palawan it's a paradise, me and my partner fell in love for this place since the first visit!
we already requested a topographic survey which will be accomplished at the beginning of March and we already collected plenty of material which may be useful during an initial feasibility assessment.

John Elliott wrote:
Two and a half hectares is a good sized piece of land, and you could generate a considerable amount of the food for your guests. But it is a disadvantage to be isolated. You don't want to have to depend on your harvests coming at the same time as your guests. How far are you from a town where you could sell your produce when you have more produce than guests?

very good point, that's why we need a consultant which can help us to create and design a sustainable cycle in a way that we can have good coverage in all season for different veggies/fruits etc..
in addition we plan to preserve/conserve/canned where it's feasible.


the idea is to find someone which could go through:
1) initial assessment through topographic map/ satellite views/ on site pictures and other info. this to provide feedback about project feasibility/risk/concerns/time line/ rough cost…. this is very important…the project is ambitious and we are beginners
2) provide a quotation of the cost with a break down of the different phases
3) visit on site for a few days to evaluate Kick off the design
4) finalize the design
5) provide a executive plan (for beginner….so my team on site can take care of the development while learning) - we need to see example about how it would look like...
6) following up remotely with he consultant and arrange periodical visit on site to check the progress

of course we will be ok if someone is willing to work on this project on site all the time, but we need to understand and agree the cost to understand if we can meet our budget.

thanks again i can't wait to receive suggestion and start this project!

Gio