Growing Knowledge: Study visit: Badilisha Eco Village

We went on a two-day study-visit to Badilisha Eco Village, during the 25-26 March. It is a demonstration farm for organic agriculture, situated at Rusinga Island, close to Mbita. Two teachers from St. Joseph's Secondary School came with us, the agriculture teacher (Maureen) and the principal of the school (Benard).

Evans, the founder of Badilisha, showed us around their farm. They were in the process of transforming their organic farm to permaculture practices. For this reason most of the projects were still in their beginning phase. Nevertheless, they had a lot of inspiring ideas. Evans also gave us a crash course in permaculture. He explained the main principles and demonstrated a lot of methods that is commonly used within permaculture, including the herb spiral, banana circle, rocket stove, swales, food forest and mandala garden.

Permaculture can be described as a consciously designed agriculture system. The main aim is to design an energy-efficient farm in a sustainable way so that it is able to satisfy the needs of the people, both today and tomorrow. Energy-efficient means that the farm should not depend on external energy sources, but instead make use of local resources. To accomplish this permaculture practicioners emphasise diversity, they use a lot of different species and plants that interacts and benefit each other. The study visit gave us a lot of knowledge and inspiration for our continued work. Thank you Evans and Badilisha! More information can be found at the Badilisha homepage.