[Sdpg] Letters from Jordan - Jordan Welcomes the 2011 International Permaculture Conference & Convergence IPC10

Fri Jun 18 07:42:28 PDT 2010

Letters from Jordan - Jordan Welcomes the 2011 
International Permaculture Conference & 
Convergence by Craig Mackintosh June 13, 2010

http://permaculture.org.au/2010/06/13/letters-from-jordan-jordan-welcomes-the-2011-international-permaculture-conference-convergence/

The famous Wadi Rum desert region, site of the 1962 Laurence of Arabia epic,
will be hosting the September 2011 IPC 10 Convergence
All photographs © copyright Craig Mackintosh

Every two years, members of the international 
permaculture community cooperate to organise an 
International Permaculture Conference (IPC). Each 
meeting is held on a different continent, and is 
made up of two separate events, serving two 
distinct purposes. The first meetings of the 
event, the conference, is aimed at permaculture 
'evangelisation', where key people of the region 
are invited to hear presentations about 
permaculture that are particularly relevant to 
them, and between meetings they can converse and 
network with the many leading permaculturists who 
attend. It helps spread permaculture in the 
respective regions. The second phase is the 
convergence, an entirely in-house get-together 
where permaculturists from around the world can 
network, share experiences and knowledge, and 
develop strategies for fast-tracking permaculture 
uptake worldwide.

Participants at the convergence also discuss and 
vote for their choice for where the next IPC 
should be held. The last IPC was held in Oct/Nov 
2009 in Lilongwe, Malawi, Africa, and at that 
event Jordan was awarded the privilege of hosting 
IPC10. It will be the first time the IPC will be 
held in the Middle East.

As such, Geoff and Nadia Lawton have been working 
with their Jordanian contacts to develop support 
for the event. And, as you'll see from what I 
share below, this effort is proving very fruitful 
to date. We now have some of the most influential 
people in the country assisting us in our plans 
to organise a highly successful IPC10.

The Princess and the Permaculturists

Jordan is officially The Hashemite Kingdom of 
Jordan. It is a constitutional monarchy. As such, 
getting the endorsement of the Jordanian Royal 
Family was high on our agenda. If this 
endorsement is secured, it virtually eliminates 
bureaucratic problems with local officials who 
may not comprehend the importance of our work for 
their nation.

What better way to gain Royal support than to 
approach Princess Basma bint Ali, an avid 
supporter, no, initiator, of environmental and 
sustainable development programs.

>From left to right: Lesley Byrne, Princess Basma bint Ali,
Nadia, Geoff and Latifa Lawton, in Amman, Jordan

It's not every day you get to meet a princess, 
but there we were. Geoff and Nadia Lawton and 
myself - from the Permaculture Research Institute 
- and Lesley Byrne of Kids are Sweet 
International, all went along to talk to Princess 
Basma bint Ali of Jordan about IPC10. We were 
scheduled for a one-hour meeting, but the 
discussion proved so interesting the appointment 
stretched to three hours.

The Princess was initially cautious in 
conversation with us. She afterwards explained 
that this was due to the many profit-oriented 
organisations who approach her with quasi-organic 
concepts that fall short of the mark and are 
ultimately detrimental to people and place. I was 
personally very pleasantly surprised to hear her 
stressing her belief that organic agriculture, in 
the forms we generally observe, typically misses 
the point, failing to take a full, holistic, 
relationship-centric view of the natural world.

The Princess has been extremely active on the 
sustainability front. Amongst her many efforts 
(she, for example, pushed for and secured a 
staged requirement that mandates and assists all 
Amman residents into water harvesting), thirteen 
years ago she conceived the idea of a Royal 
Botanic Gardens that would showcase biodiversity 
preservation techniques. The RBG consists of 
approximately 800 hectares of land overlooking 
the King Talal Dam (map), approximately 25 
kilometres north of the capital, Amman. This is 
no usual Botanical Garden, as the Princess 
explained - but rather a research and educational 
station trialing water harvesting techniques 
(including swales, gabions, etc.), plant guilds 
and much more, with a vision of water use 
maximisation, native species preservation, soil 
building, reforestation and landscape repair.

A paragraph from a book on the RGB that she 
kindly gave me provides insights into her vision, 
one she has unwittingly - until now - shared with 
permaculturists:

Drought is not just a matter of bad luck in 
rainfall: clearing the land for agriculture, 
animal forage and construction actually makes a 
landscape inhospitable to rain. Of all the 
available water in the air 15-20% falls as rain - 
if it can condense on organic nuclei heavy enough 
to fall from the air. Of this 80-85% of condensed 
'leaf water', approximately 20% evaporates again 
into the air; approximately 50% is transpired by 
plants and forms clouds - if it can condense on 
organic nuclei. 10-15% re-enters groundwater to 
become streams & river. Trees produce more of the 
water in rivers than rainfall does. At least 50% 
of every cloud is composed of condensation from 
trees.

In addition to being surprised and suitably 
impressed with the Princess' insights, I was also 
promptly battling feelings of frustration! This 
was due to the fact that we completely shared the 
Princess' concerns about plant-focussed 'organic' 
agriculture and it was thus an unexpected and 
almost comedic turn of events for us to be on the 
defensive in this regard!

But, after a lively discussion of various 
projects occuring worldwide, including what is 
arguably the largest land regeneration project in 
the world, the Princess began to discern that we 
were wholly on her side of the fence on these 
issues! In short, we were all speaking the same 
language, and by the end of the meeting she fully 
recognised this.

We not only left with a royal endorsement for the 
2011 conference, but two of her staff will now 
also be taking a PDC in Jordan under Geoff in 
October 2010!

NCARE (National Centre for Agricultural Research 
and Extension) are well and truly on side

Geoff and Nadia Lawton stand with the head of NCARE
and a few of his team members

People who have watched the updated Greening the 
Desert II video may recognise Mohammed Ayesh 
(above, at right), a Water & Environment 
Researcher who spent considerable time at the 
original Greening the Desert site in the Dead Sea 
valley (the lowest place on earth at 400 metres 
below sea level), where Geoff transformed a piece 
of salted desert landscape into a productive food 
forest and garden system in three years. Mohammed 
researched the impact of Geoff's permaculture 
implementation, resulting in his becoming an avid 
supporter of all things permacultural. He even 
published a book in Arabic on the topic (see 
video link above for more on this), circulating 
it to hundreds of people in the agriculture field 
in Jordan, and, despite his meek-mannered 
personality has been persistently pestering his 
boss, the head of this Jordanian government 
agricultural department, to do what he can to 
support the growth of permaculture in Jordan.

Just after we arrived in in the country last 
week, as we were travelling to a consultancy in 
Wadi Rum, the famously beautiful desert region in 
the deep south of the country, Mohammed 
repeatedly tried to contact us. As it turned out, 
the head of NCARE wanted to meet with us, for 
reasons unknown.

We found time to meet with them later in Amman, 
discovering they had got wind of our intention to 
stage the IPC in the country, and wanted to see 
how they could help. We had intended to solicit 
their support, but they beat us to it!

NCARE talks to Geoff and Nadia Lawton about organising IPC10.
Geoff taught a PDC to 18 NCARE staff in 2003

NCARE committed to organising accommodation for 
conference attendees - with options for different 
budgets. They will arrange a conference hall, and 
provide for our technical needs (projectors, 
etc.) and, wait for it, they will in addition use 
their influence to clear all visas! Considering 
we anticipate many arriving from two-thirds world 
countries, who can often get rejected, this 
latter assistance is particularly significant.

Conference and Convergence Locations and Dates

We're still ironing out the details, and we 
welcome your input, but the tentative plans for 
the two meetings are as follows:

The conference would be a one day event - but 
possibly two - held in the capital of Amman. The 
opening dinner would be the evening of Friday 
September 16th, 2011. A full conference day would 
follow on September 17th, with presentations from 
several keynote speakers, focussing on issues 
relevant to dryland regions. The 18th would be a 
leisurely day of travel to Wadi Rum, the site of 
the convergence, 285 kilometres (or 3.5 hours) to 
the south. We would arrange buses for this trip. 
The convergence would be a three-day event, held 
in a fantastic campsite amongst some of the 
world's most beautiful desert scenery, complete 
with Bedouin tents, solar lighting and amenities.

The Wadi Rum campsite is 45 minutes from Jordan's 
only port, Aqaba on the Red Sea, and one and a 
half hours from the ancient city of Petra (BC600) 
- of Indiana Jones and the last Crusade fame, and 
former home to the more deservingly famous 
Nabataeans who were experts in water harvesting.

In addition to permaculture group events, we 
intend to have a few Bedouin share some of their 
traditional knowledge - on such subjects as 
herbs, weaving, fermenting (yoghurt), etc.

Jordan welcomes the permaculture world

This is personally my second visit to the 
country, and, like Geoff, I'm starting to feel 
right at home here. The people are full of smiles 
and very welcoming. (I don't know how many 
"Welcome to Jordan"'s I've received!) It is a 
region of cultural diversity, rich heritage and 
incredible historical significance.

There's more to tell from this trip, so watch for 
another post or two - but we're excited about the 
potential to continue to build on the tireless 
labours of Geoff and Nadia and many others for 
the people of Jordan and the Middle East. These 
nations are the most water stressed of any, and, 
as you can see, they're eager to find solutions. 
It's a pleasure to work for them.

With this post I am passing along a big "welcome" 
from the generous, warm-hearted people of Jordan. 
The people here want you to be part of this 
solutions-focussed effort for the region!

Stay tuned to this site, as in the coming weeks 
we will provide additional finalised details, and 
provide you with the ability to book your place.

Photos of Wadi Rum Convergence campsite (more pictures of Wadi Rum below that):

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