SEAL Project awarded 6 hectares for Permacultural development

Tilyeubyek 'Bek' Yeltai, Food Security Director for ADRA-Mongolia, confirmed today that the local governments of Ulgii City and Bugat soum in Bayan Ulgii province have awarded two 3-hectare land parcels to the SEAL Project for development into permacultural demonstration and education sites.

"We are working on designs for the parcels now," said Bek. "The land parcels are barren and rocky, but the soil underneath looks rich and moist; they are close to the river, and sheltered by the nearby hills."

The list of 146 useful plant species suitable for growing in Bayan Ulgii's climatic conditions compiled Dr Beket's research team over the last few years will be a valuable resource to support the design for this new development in the SEAL Project.

Establishing large-scale demonstration sites give Project staff another location to conduct trainings, and a place to test experimental designs and techniques (such as plant guilds, worm farm designs, and mycellium innoculation of soils) for their effectiveness before implementing new ideas into the field (where an ineffective design could cause a family to go hungry).

The SEAL Project team will document development of the sites with photography and video (coming soon), to show how quickly a bare patch of land can be brought into production through permaculture and regenerative design.

We'll keep you posted!

Photo: View of Ulgii City, from the base of the surrounding hills.

Permaculture project in Mongolia provides low-energy solutions —on Transition Voice.com

via transitionvoice.com

We sent Transition Voice a postcard from Mongolia, and they decided to publish it!

Final Design Presentations: Bastama School (Day 18)

 

Superintendent Bolathan was so pleased with the design that Dr. Beket's team presented, that he asked if he could take the plans back to Bastama School with him.  Of course we said yes!

 

See the full gallery on Posterous

Highlights from the design:

•     Flower beds planted along school entry to attract beneficial insects and prospective parents.
•     Experimental summer veggie garden plots for all grade levels, including outdoor learning areas.
•     Stone pathways laid along major energy flows to beautify, and increase thermal mass on-site.
•     Greenhouse built onto south-facing wall of school gym to tap into existing heating system for possible year-round production.
•     Chicken house (complete w/ incubator) installed adjacent to gymnasium furnace room.
•     Winter chicken run opening into heated greenhouse.
•     Ideas to integrate learning from classroom to greenhouse, including ecology, maths, science, biology, geography and social studies.
•     Mini-food-forest windbreak long sheltered western perimeter.
•     Rooftop water catchment to feed flowerbeds, tree crops, veggie beds, and greenhouse.
•     Detailed, 3-year rotation composting toilet system designed.

 

Improvements suggested by Instructors:

•     Flowerbeds extended to any available edge to increase insect diversity and visual appeal.
•     Summer vegge gardens planted with IPM species around perimeter.
•     Consolidate composting area and root cellar into heated greenhouse to maximize efficiency.
•     Create mobile chicken tractor using rope netting to weed & fertilize tree plantations and summer growbeds.
•     Extend food forest into northwest corner, which is empty if composting area & root cellar are consolidated into greenhouse.   
•     Composting toilet system simplified to better match local culture.

 

Reforesting the Barrens of Bayan Ulgii (Day 09)

It should be duly noted here, that upon entering Bayan Ulgii province, we did not see any trees until we arrived in Ulgii City.  Locals can remember that only two generations ago, the river flats of Ulgii City, and much of the rest of the province, were covered in trees.

 

All were cut down for winter fuel and building materials.

 

However, the Trees are making a comeback, locals are recognizing the importance of these Guardians of the Earth(i), and in most fenced public spaces (which keep the grazing animals at bay) trees, almost exclusively Siberian Larch (larix siberica), have been planted to beautify the City Center streets.  The river flats of Bayan Ulgii want to be treed; you can tell by how vigourously they grow given the slightest chance.

 

Special Guest Instructor (and student) Dr Beket gave the lesson on Trees today, from his work over the past few years in Bayan Ulgii:

 

Photo: Dr. Beket teaches about trees.

Of special interest, the Doctor's Bastama School Project, in which the Superintendent gets excited about planting 100 trees on the schoolgrounds, and organizes for workers to be there one weekend to accept delivery of what he thinks will be a caravan of lorries carting in trees by the truckload for transplanting, only to be met by Dr Becket holding two small plastic bags full of sticks.

 

The next school day, as bewildered grownups walked past 100 oversized pencils sticking out of the ground, one parent declared the Old Man crazy, and promised to cut his own nose off if any of those sticks actually grew any taller than his child.

 

Fast forward three years later, and the results speak for themselves (although we are pretty sure the aforementioned parent's nose remains intact):

 

Photo: 4 year old 'saplings'.

Meet Populus laurifolia (known locally as 'Fast White'), a tree that strikes easily from cuttings, can grow at a rate of about a meter-and-a-half each year (in a 90-day growing season, mind you), and can withstand -50C winters in an area which receives only 114mm of rainfall (most of which falls over 3 months).

 

The Barrens of Bayan Ulgii can be reforested.

Photo: Dr. Beket and I in front of his school tree plantation.

_________________________________
(i) 'TREES: Guardians of the Earth' by Bill Mollison, 1998