The Permaculture course, taught at our Green Center by leading Israeli environmentalists, is teaching Bedouin and Jewish participants the theory and practice of sustainable local resource use. Participants will receive an internationally recognized permaculture certificate.
BUSTAN Permaculture Course at the Green Center, Beersheva
Part 1) Three month weekly course learning through theory and hands on practice the principles of permaculture
Part 2) individual supervised projects implementing permaculture principles in the participants' own communities. Graduates will receive an internationally recognized permaculture certificate.
Participants: Residents of the Negev, especially the leadership of Bedouin unrecognized villages. There are 14 Bedouin and Jewish students currently in the course.
Goals:
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Promote the use of permaculture—ways of planning and thinking sustainably—in the Negev;
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Educate representatives of the Bedouin and Jewish communities about how permaculture can be used to improve local conditions by using resources sustainably;
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Create model “green" projects that can be replicated throughout the region;
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Create a core group of local leaders who have the tools of analysis and planning to respond to local issues and implement projects that are sustainable and appropriate, promoting community health and personal empowerment;
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Participants will be empowered to find sustainable solutions to ecological problems in their villages, particularly those due to their unrecognized status.
Topics include: organic agriculture (from individual to village scale), ways to build land fertility in a desert without using pesticides, creating compost, eco-building that uses eco-friendly systems and local materials, clean energy, recycling, grey water systems, local currency based on cooperation, and more.
Instructors: The instructors of the course are: Meirav Khofi, a lecturer of Arabic and a sustainable project coordinator in the field of permaculture; Dor Chovkin, from an ecological initiative company, who received certification in permaculture from the international center in Australia; and coordinator Michal Vital, planner and green building consultant, member of BUSTAN since its inception, and a graduate of the Heschel Center's Environmental Leadership Fellows Program. Michal was one of the leaders of the team that designed and built BUSTAN's Wadi al Na'am stawbale solar-powered medical clinic, and has planned numerous ecologically friendly buildings throughout the country. She serves as a green consultant for homes and neighborhoods and is a sought after lecturer.
Course Location: Last year, BUSTAN opened our Green Center in Beersheva. The Center is located in an apartment with an adjacent yard and access to the roof. This site offers a comfortable and accessible location for the course for the residents of the surrounding villages. At the same time, it will provide a living example for sustainable development of a small site.
Dates: Weekly evenings, including a common meal, from April through August, with Phase II beginning in October 2008.
