Yayasan Permakultur Kalimantan

Centre for Sustainability and Culture

 Frederika Paembonan

Mid year interim report • November 2014-July 2015

SUMMARY

The first nine months of Yayasan Permakultur Kalimantan has revealed both opportunities and challenges, both serving as platforms to grow. In May of this year, we moved into the Sukamulya Permaculture Demonstration site -- a dwelling serving multifaceted purposes including, a residential site for the site caregivers, lodging for international volunteers, office space, training room, and an emerging showcase permaculture farm. We have enjoyed the support of the local and international community through our successful crowdfunding. Furthermore, we have greatly appreciated the loyal support of the first assistant to the Mayor Pak Herie Saksono, who has helped widen our local network among government officials, community members and NGO’s. We have become a member of Susila Dharma International Association,

 Susila Dharma Indonesia as well as received grants for Susila Dharma USA and Susila Dharma Australia. Whilst the core mission and approach of our Foundation remains the same, the team profile has changed dramatically with only two core active team members remaining: one office staff member and one field team members, working voluntarily due to lack of funding for salary. Another challenge has been the unexpected health issues faced by our permaculture advisor, Jayadi. Our plans to build the new site was put on hold during a few months of illness at the start of the year, though fortunately, Jayadi underwent a full recovery and our project was set back in motion. The reduced team on the ground has meant that we have had to pay for additional local labour in the establishment of site infrastructure. Despite the challenges, the project is picking up a natural momentum of its own attributed to the merit of the work and the support received by the community along the way. The following report will provide a summary of activities and the achievements of YPK’s first 9 months to date.

Sukamulya Permaculture Demonstration Site

One of the most fundamental activities of YPK is to establish a place in which we can demonstrate the effectiveness of using permaculture as a tool for sustainable development in the community. In this light, it is imperative that the permaculture demonstration site is developed to serve as the foundation of our work, providing tangible evidence that intelligent, ecologically-based, permaculture practices create abundance. We hope to provide an alternative from harmful industrial practices that are endangering the region’s natural environment and food security. With this model, our goal is to showcase the success of permaculture and ultimately, improve the region’s social welfare, health and quality of life. Work on the demonstration site began in late January 2015. As of July 2015 we have successfully achieved the following:

- Successfully retrofitting existing structure on site including:

-Old asbestos roof removed and new roof built for water harvesting with gutters installed.

- Building design modified to passively cool the residence.

- Increased electrical capacity on site, re-wired and reinstalled light and electrical fittings in every room.

-Housing and accommodation established for caretakers and residential volunteers.

- Office space and temporary training/function room established with library.

  - Functional kitchen established.

- Successfully improved water resources on site including:

- Erection of Water tower.

- New water tank and water irrigation piping installed.

- Water pump installed.

- Existing wells closed off with custom made concrete lids.

- Water connected and installed in the residence.

- Temporary grey water and garden filtration system established. -Nursery established on South side of property.��� -Storage room and workshop shed established.

-Waste Management:

- Composting systems established including:

- Cold Compost system.

���- Hot Compost system.���

- Vermiculture system (worm farm).

-Other permaculture systems onsite:

- Mobile chicken coop built and operating with 5 chickens and 6 new chicks

- Hugelkultur system, (also known as carbon farming) utilising waste tree logs and wood buried into garden beds.

- Food Dehydrator- System built using recycled���and reclaimed materials used on site. A natural system to��� dry and preserve food (fruit, fish, dry seeds) without the use of any preservatives or additives.

- Seed bank trials have begun with propagation of a select variety of legumes,

 

which were sourced from organic farms in India, Australia, Indonesia and Central Kalimantan. We have in our stock approximately 70 organic seed native seeds varieties gathered from three years of work internationally.

- Activated bio-charcoal production.

Education and Training

Jayadi Paembonan of YPK recently work with USAID to deliver sustainable land management and permaculture training to assist the socialization of forest and land fire incidents in Sebangau Kuala, Central Kalimantan. This was part of the USAID International Forestry and Climate Strategy, July-August 2015.

Habaring Hurung: In November 2014 YPK mobilised a 10 day intensive permaculture training in the village of Habaring Hurung at the request of the assistant to the Mayor, Pak Herie Saksono. The training was a one-off free service to the community by YPK educator Jayadi Paembonan. The training had 16 participants including 3 NGO workers.

Arso Susetyo , WWF NGO worker and participant of YPK’s Intensive Permaculture Training said this about our training:

“This is a revolutionary way of thinking about agriculture and sustainable environmental development. This is the work we need to be doing here in Central Kalimantan”. (Habaring Hurung village, Central Kalimantan, November 2014)

The impact of this training still continues 6 months on. The 3 NGO workers that attended the training are now actively implementing permaculture on different project locations in both Kalimantan Tengah and South Kalimantan.

 

-NGO worker, Arso Susetyo, orginally from WWF has started the Kalampangan Palangka Raya Project applying what he learnt in YPK’s Habaring Hurung training.

- NGO worker’s Fadly Amiha and Yuliana Nona have successfully delivered field based permaculture education to communities in Desa Uren, Halong, South Kalimantan Province. Fadly will bring some of these community members to visit our Sukamulya permaculture demonstration site, to witness hands on application of permaculture in the near future.

The implementation of permaculture in the village of Habaring Hurung by the local youth community project group ‘Karung Taruna’ is currently on hold due to some internal matters that this community group needs to address.

Volunteer Program

The YPK volunteer program is a mutually beneficial arrangement whereby people who volunteer can learn more about the practical application of permaculture, have a local cultural experience and may even enjoy free accommodation in exchange for regular labour contributing valuably to YPK demonstration site’s development as well as YPK’s other programs.

In 2015 we have had very positive support from international volunteers. We recently hosted 2 volunteers, Kate Verrell from England and Bastian Sudan from France, who lived on site and volunteered for a period of 1.5 months from end of May until start of July. They were instrumental to helping us continue to prepare and develop our onsite farm.

Our most recent international volunteer was Paige Walters, from Ohio USA, who is studying her Masters in International Development focused on sustainability. She has recently completed a Permaculture Design Course (PDC) in

 Thailand prior to arriving here and supported YPK with the development and delivery of the school recycling program at BCU school, part of the YPK’s broader School Environmental Awareness Program.

We will promote our volunteer program via our facebook page to help attract new international and local volunteers.

Collaboration, Networking and Professional Development

YPK is a now an associate member of Susila Dharma International Association, Susila Dharma Indonesia and the IFACS Multi Stakeholder forum, a USAID initiative in Palangka Raya.

In June last month, Robert Hii of ‘Friends of the Orangutans’, Canada visited Palangka Raya and was escorted to various projects by YPK’s Jayadi Paembonan. One outcome of these visits is that YPK and Sebangau National Park (TNS) are currently developing an MOU whereby YPK will move into the area of forestry conservation and rehabilitation through supervising on a monthly basis the nursery development and reforestation of 30 hectares of land in TNS.

 Sustainable Enterprise development

We have started to develop a range of sustainable handicrafts for sale to help support YPK’s programs. We have Ulin gourmet spoons hand crafted from recycled wood sourced from the beams of the permaculture site building. We also have a handmade wooden mortar, in which the pestles are made from benuas wood for the base and the hand grinder has been made from the wood of our rambutan tree and traditional Kalimantan Mandau.

Cultural Activities

One of the important ways to communicate the themes of sustainability and conservation is develop strong relationships with the community through cultural activities.

YPK is partnering with Australian based Curious Legends Theatre Company to create ‘Penjelajahan Orang Hutan- Adventure of the Jungle People’, a collaborative theatre performance in November this year.

Last March we facilitated a visit with the director of Curious Legends, Mitchell Reese in preparation in preparation for this project. This creative collaborative theatre project will bring 5 professional puppeteers and performers from Australia to our site in Kalimantan, where we will develop a community street theatre performance set for early December 2015.

 

The theme of this performance will be to deliver the message of environmental sustainability in a fun and interactive way to the community. Curious Legends have successfully secured $10,000AU from the Australian Indonesian Institute to cover the project costs associated with the project. This project is supported by the City of Palangka Raya and the city of Palangka Raya’s Department of Tourism.

On the 6th of June we held a Selamatan to welcome the community to our new YPK site and residence. This community gathering was followed by musical jamming, spoken word and dance into the night with members of the local and international community as well as local theatre and dance groups. It was a dynamic and culturally creative evening that was a perfect way to open up our project to the community.

On the 3rd of July we held a farewell for our international volunteers Kate and Bastian. This evening was also celebrated with traditional dayak dance (photo bottom left) by some professional dancers and members of our community displaying their amazing talents. The dancers also dressed our volunteers up in traditional dress (bottom right photo) and painted tattoos as a special experience to thank them and celebrate their contribution to YPK’s project.