IDEP started this year’s training by hosting a 5-day training of Introduction to Permaculture. The training took place in the IDEP training center on 27-31 January. It was participated by 12 NGO staff and youth community members who have been working in community development in their respective areas. Other than Bali, most of the participants came from NGOs work in Sumatera and Sulawesi. Meanwhile, the trainers and facilitators team came from IDEP and Kw Kreasi.
First Day
In order to have a real impact, IDEP’s permaculture master trainer Sayu Komang started the training by inviting the participants to first identify the problems they faced while carrying out community development programs, especially those related to sustainability issues. With that basis, Sayu, her nickname, then invited them to connect it with the ethics and principles of permaculture, permaculture design based on natural patterns, and zone mapping. All the materials were exercised through a combination of theory and practice.
Second Day
Sayu invited the participants to learn about the importance of planning (design) before starting to use land. One of the ways is through the permaculture zone mapping, starting from the smallest zone, namely the household, to the outer zone such as a protected forest. To be more impactful, they were also asked to draw up the maps based on the conditions of their neighborhood or work areas.
Sayu also invited them to go more “down the garden”, learn directly in the garden. Even though the sun is quite stinging, they persist to learn about how to utilize sloping land with simple technology, water storage and filtration systems, household waste management systems, and permaculture-based house. Once again, to be more impactful, all the materials they learned are put in the context of participants’ daily experiences.
Third-Day
IDEP believes that healthy food starts with both healthy seeds and soil. Therefore, IDEP’s senior trainer Wayan Suartana invited the participants to trace back the initial process to produce healthy food. There, they were invited to learn about the soil rehabilitation system, soil health tests with appropriate technology, mulching, household waste composting, hatcheries, and nurseries.
Interestingly, everything that they learn can be self-sufficiently applied using appropriate technology and environmentally friendly natural materials that are easily found around them. With this provision, IDEP believes that they are able to help their assisted-farmers solving problems.
To make the vision of how permaculture be applied more concretely, the participants were invited to visit and learn from Kw Kreasi. There, in addition to being presented with various examples of permaculture practices that apply Less External Input and Sustainable Agriculture (LEISA), they were also invited to learn about rice cultivation using the System of Rice Intensification (SRI).
In the next session back to the IDEP training center, they were also invited to learn about the environmentally-friendly integrated pest management system, home garden management system both for urban and rural, as well as the implementation of an integrated livestock management system. To meet the local context of each participant, all of these topics were exercised through discussion and hands-on practice.
Fifth Day
IDEP always strives to encourage everyone to has a concrete follow-up plan after participating in our training. Therefore, from the beginning until the end of the training, all the participants were facilitated to have that follow-up plan. Later on, IDEP will monitor the plan implementation in their respective places or organizations.
On that last day also, the IDEP team invited them to learn about the aquaculture system that is integrated with farms and livestock, the appropriate technology, and postharvest product processing. With this provision during 5-day training, all the participants were expected to be able to implement the follow-up plan based on their local context. (Ed)