The Permaculture Research Institute of Australia

I first got introduced to the concept of Permaculture and met Geoff Lawton when I made the original 5 minute flash presentation, "Greening the Desert" about Geoff's activities in Jordan for the Australian ABC Online website.

Since then we've partnered with Geoff and Nadia and PRI to produce a number of DVDs on Permaculture with Geoff's expert instruction that are available from the PRI shop at http://www.permaculture.org.au

We started off making a film about earthworks, swales and building a dam at a property at Woolgoolga in Northern NSW that we called "Harvesting Water the Permaculture Way." Geoff had been keen for some time to make a film about that subject.

The following year we made, "Establishing a Food Forest" that shows the stages and evolution of a sustainable Permaculture food forest system from sowing the seeds to harvesting the fruit. We finish up visiting Bill Mollison's "wild system" that had been abandoned and left to grow on its own. That proved to be a very memorable experience with grass up to your waist, brown snakes coiled on the ground ready to strike. Geoff Lawton sucking on a wild passion-fruit and discovering large Jak fruit growing under the forest canopy. That's part of the thrill of making a film. You are not sure how it will end and you learn so much more about Permaculture as you go along for the ride.

The "Introduction to Permaculture" DVD was aimed at more of the beginning Permaculture student new to the idea and wanting a better introduction to the whole concept. We tried to make some of the concepts more accessible and easier to understand. I know it proved to be a tougher challenge than I originally thought.

My favourite DVD is the "Permaculture Soils" DVD with Geoff Lawton. There's a lot of good information in it. I was chatting with Murray Hallam recently, whom we also make Aquaponics DVDs with and Murray showed the Soils DVD to his old father-in-law who is quite elderly now and infirm. Murray says his father-in-law practised Permaculture before the term was invented. He was a fanatical gardener and a very thrifty man who never threw anything out and understood the principles of recycling. The old bloke is now too old to do any gardening and is hooked up to an oxygen mask for most of the day but he loved watching the segment on Geoff Lawton doing the 18 Day compost. Geoff was mixing various manures together with straw, and the old guy would suddenly bolt up in his bed and nod and yell out while pointing at the screen saying "That bloke on TV is a very intelligent man!"

Currently for 2011 we are in pre production on an Urban Permaculture DVD as well as a Backyard Chickens DVD. We are currently completing the DIY Aquaponics DVD which will be out in March 2011. Two hours of quality instruction from Murray Hallam. Not everyone can afford to buy a kit system so if you are handy with a skill saw and hammer, this DVD will show you how to build a system from 3 x 1000 litre IBC Tote tanks. These tanks are commonly used by industry to store chemicals and liquid foodstuffs. You can buy them on ebay reasonably cheaply. If you can source three IBC's then you can make a fish and vegetable production system. Detailed plans are also included on the DVD disk.

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