Permaculture is an approach to designing sustainable human settlements and agricultural systems by emulating natural ecologies. It was developed in the 1970s in Australia and integrates principles from organic gardening, agroforestry and energy-efficient construction. The goal of permaculture is to create systems that are self-maintaining by maximizing beneficial relationships and minimizing waste through careful observation of natural cycles. It aims to meet human needs for food, shelter and other materials in a way that does not degrade the environment or deplete resources. Permaculture is based on ethics of earth care, people care and fair share and utilizes principles such as observing interactions and harvesting renewable resources sustainably.

1. Livelihood
(Permaculture)

2. Understanding the concept of
Permaculture
• Etymologically the word permaculture was
derived from two common English words;
perma nent and agri culture combined to
mean permaculture, by taking the first five
words from permanent and the last seven
words from agriculture

3. • It was coined by two Australian men Bill
Mollison and David Holmgren in the 1970’s.
Integrating lessons from ecology, organic
gardening, energy-efficient building and agro-
forestry, permaculture[4] principles help
people to design rich and sustainable ways of
living. What we might usually think of as
waste put back into the system, recycling
precious resources. Landscapes are designed
to conserve water, energy and soil nutrients

4. • The principles and techniques of permaculture
are used to design sustainable systems of food
production that work with nature for
maximum long-term efficiency, mainly
promoting home and large scale sustainable
agriculture

5. • Permaculture is defined as consciously
designed landscapes which mimic the patterns
and relationships found in nature, while
yielding an abundance of food, fiber and
energy for the provision of local needs

6. • Mollison (1988) gave an elaborated definition and
wrote that permaculture (permanent agriculture)
is a conscious design and maintenance of
agriculturally productive ecosystems which have
the diversity, sustainability, stability and resilience
of natural ecosystem. It is the harmonious
integration of landscape and people providing
their food, energy shelter and other material and
non-material needs in a sustainable manner.

10. • Permaculture is an approach to designing
human settlements and agricultural
systems that mimic the relationships
found in natural ecologies. It is a
philosophy of working with, rather than
against nature. It is a design science that is
rooted in the observation of nature. It is a
positive, solution-based way of thinking,
using a practical set of ecological design
principles and methods

11. • Permaculture shows how to observe the dynamics of
natural ecosystems. We can apply this knowledge in
designing constructed ecosystems that serve the needs
of human populations without degrading our natural
environment. Permaculture design requires careful
observation of the natural cycles, energies and
resources on a site, we can design a system that
imitates nature and takes on a life of its own. Once the
design is implemented on the ground, the system can
be largely self-maintaining. It can yield a variety of high
quality food, fiber and energy to meet basic human
needs and by reconciling life hood and the ecosystem
makes livelihood environmentally friendly

12. • Nature works in its own, even more perfect
without human intervention. This can shortly
expressed as nature’s closed system, for nature’s
population meet their needs internally without
external intervention. Therefore, learning from
nature’s self-regulation, permaculture tries to
design a system which is approximately a closed
system to meet the needs of nature (including
human beings) in a sustainable and undisturbed
natural ecosystem

13. • Ethics and Principles of Permaculture
• Permaculture is to large extent concerned with
attitudinal change towards the natural ecology, a
culture of conserving the natural ecosystem by
getting our necessities from and without
depleting the system. For this the proponents
adopted some ethical grounds of permaculture
and the principles to work with permaculture.
These ethical grounds and principles of
permaculture are discussed below

26. Ethics of Permaculture
• Permaculture is an ethics-based systems design practice used to
form sustainable human settlements that have the same natural
resilience as a healthy ecosystem. It works based on the following
general ethical grounds.
• 1. Care of Earth: care for living and non-living things, including
plants, animals, land, water and air. In other words having an
attitude that the earth is the source of living.
• 2. Care of People: helping each other and ourselves to live
sustainably. This includes providing access to resources that are
necessary for existence.
• 3. Fair shares: using the earth’s limited resources in a ways that are
equitable and wise.

28. Principles of Permaculture
• The first principle is about observation and
interaction. Since the practice of permaculture
is based on design, it requires careful
observation of the elements of the
environment and the landscape in the vicinity

29. Principles of Permaculture
The second principle states about harvesting
resources that enable for maintaining the
ecosystem sustainably. This includes
dependence on renewable resources than non-
renewable resources for livelihood asset
formation