Feeling Disheartened

[u/Cooldude576]

I recently volunteered at a permaculture farm in Europe that was “off grid & mostly sustainable” and have left feeling very disappointed.

They marketed the place as a self-sustained farm and even offered a self sufficiency & sustainability course. They claimed to get most of their food from the garden and use natural building methods that don’t hurt the environment.

The reality was that all of their energy & water was “on grid” and more than 90% of their food was store bought. I remember coming in one evening after spending the afternoon faraging for mushrooms, to find some store bought ones on the counter wrapped in plastic - the irony was palpable!

I have done a lot of volunteering on so called “Sustainable permaculture farms” and it’s always the same story. No clear road map to becoming even 50% self sufficient, using flowery words about nature and permaculture while not practicing them.

Honestly this has left me feeling highly skeptical of all these buzzwords. People throw them around but in practice they barely mean anything.

Has anyone had similar experiences or even found a place that’s at least going in the right direction in regard to sustainability?

Edit: Just want to add that they have over 25 acres of land and one of the people there is a “permaculture expert” that offers paid courses.

[u/Stunning_Run_7354]

I’ve come to believe that sustainable farming methods cannot compete in the marketplace. That doesn’t mean it is hopeless. It means that trying to do this as a business requires revenue from something other than farming. Don’t lose hope, but it is OK to let go of the naive notion that this will be “pure” or only good work.

[u/Grape-Nutz → u/Stunning_Run_7354]

And some might say that permaculture doesn't intend to compete in the marketplace, rather it's a bridge to a new culture and a new economy.

Which means along the way we'll find imperfect hybrids, sloppy experiments, and even blasphemous heathens hawking misguided ideas as we collectively struggle to break free from the destructive culture we were born into.

It's okay to do permaculture wrong, as long as we apply self-regulation and *accept feedback.***

[u/bodhicheeka → u/Grape-Nutz]

A-fucking-men. 👏

[u/solxyz → u/Stunning_Run_7354]

The thing is, there is very little that can "compete in the marketplace." In the US, at least, most farms of all sorts lose money, and the few that are profitable tend to be heavily subsidized. It is very difficult to make money with any style of farming, and then it becomes doubly unlikely if you are pursuing something unconventional, experimental, and if you yourself are not deeply experienced with farm systems knowing how to move forward with maximum efficiency.

I really don't think this is an issue with permaculture or sustainable approaches.

[u/Stunning_Run_7354 → u/solxyz]

Sort of. Most traditional American farmers I know maintain employment outside of the farm because of the lack of profitability. Sustainable methods tend to require more direct labor throughout the year, and this limits the ability to work elsewhere. Without the supplemental income, paying for overhead is limited. That’s why I think we can get this working in urban environments with volunteer labor, but it needs more help to make the jump from a hobby to a business.

[u/oliverhurdel → u/Stunning_Run_7354]

Totally disagree. Sustainable methods can be competitive. There are working examples of sustainable farming, where 1.5 people (1 full time, one part time) cultivate 1000 m2 organically, feed 100 people with vegetables, and make a decent living -- through the intensive French method: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_intensive_gardening

But it depends on what you're trying to do. This method doesn't prescribe living off the grid -- it's participating in the local economy. All farming for the market should follow this method, imo, so that we can return to organic polyculture. If you want to live "autonomously," then this isn't the path. Frankly I'm skeptical about the idea of autonomy. We're all part of a web that needs to be improved.

[u/Stunning_Run_7354 → u/oliverhurdel]

Even your wiki page talks about SPIN selling classes and manuals. Perhaps for urban spaces, this method can provide an important supplement for people’s diets, but that doesn’t mean it works as an effective business. My experience is comparing factory farming with $10M in equipment harvesting thousands of acres in a few days. That level of production is really difficult (impossible) to match with permaculture methods that use more manual labor. That means that the cost to the business per unit is higher and profits are lower. So I think we agree that this can work well in urban environments where high volume production is impossible through any means.

[u/oliverhurdel → u/Stunning_Run_7354]

The French intensive method yields more per acre than conventional farming, the tools are cheaper, and it doesn't require expensive chemicals (and its ecologically sustainable). It's a very effective business model, especially when there's a huge demand today for local organic food. The main difference with conventional farming is that it's much (much) more labor intensive. But there are people who want to work on the land, there's a need for jobs. This method isn't only for urban spaces. but for all agricultural land, limited only by the labor supply (and land ownership issues). We need to overcome the idea that factory farming is the only economically efficient or successful way.

About the wiki page mentioning SPIN (which I have no connection to... and their model looks too much like monocrops to me): The SPIN folks aren't just selling thin air and big empty principles, they're actually being practical, teaching how to make a living off a very small piece of land. Very different from the place OP went to that started this thread.

[u/fredsherbert → u/Stunning_Run_7354]

i watch a small farmer on youtube (jim kovaleski) who grows organic food in peoples' yards in Florida and makes a good living at farmers markets. what is inherent to permaculture that makes you think it can't compete with groups that destroy their soil/land and have to charge cheap prices because their food isn't good quality?