I have been a teacher working in Taiwan for several years now. I also have been interested in
Permaculture for sometime, and went to Australia to take a course with Geoff, and many others along the way.
I finally moved back to Texas, to work on a
Permaculture project here. That's my basic background.
I'm going to run a trip for Taiwanese college aged students that are interested in
Permaculture. I want to introduce them to a general range of "Permaculture" farms/projects, with particular focus on things that are relevant to them. A bit about Taiwan for those who aren't familiar. It is mostly sub-tropical, with the southern part being tropical, and densely populated in the cities. The entire country is only about the size of New Jersey, with more than half of that being mountains.
Here are my basic ideas: Rocky Mountain Perm. Inst. because of the
greenhouse, and high mountains that is found all over Taiwan.
- I'm looking for a Perm. farm with rice paddies, since that's a big part of their farming
- Also Chinapa's would be amazing, since you see all those great plans in Bill's Perm.
books, I just don't know anyone who has one
- Another really big one, and I might go to a couple because this is big, is a rooftop
gardening. This could be huge in Taiwan with so many people living in cities, with a high standard of living to support the rooftop gardens income
- Small Scale Aquaponics is another big one. I'm in Texas, so I have been looking at
Jack Spirko's setup, and he youtubes a lot on the subject.
-Lastly I think a good food forest, preferably in a hotter place (Florida?), would be a good idea. Taiwan has a massive amount of beetle nut plantations that could be transitioned over to a
polyculture set-up
The program will run about 3-4 weeks, and start from my home in Texas, so the route and distance is something to consider for the project. I'll probably need to stick to one side of the country or the other to keep us at sites and not on the road all the time. Any recommendations on sites/farms would be great. Thanks Permies Community.
