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9th Call of the Mountain Latin America: The 9th Call of the Mountain - Setting a Pace for our Social Movement
In January, at the South of Colombia, at the very heart of the country’s conflict zone, ecovillagers, indigenous, afrodescendants, peasants and citizens were all together dancing, communicating, sharing and envisioning under the fiery sun crowning the mountains of Guambia, territory of the Misak indigenous people. They were there to celebrate the ninth gathering of the Call of the Mountain - Llamado de la Montaña 2015 - the most relevant annual gathering of CASA Colombia. Jennifer Trujillo … Read more
India Siddarth Ecovillage, India: Young Tribal Girls Become Barefoot Organic Agricultural Scientists
Jyotshna, Gurbari and Meena, three Munda tribal girls never thought that in their adolescence they would be appreciated in their own village for bringing transformation into conventional agricultural patterns, and become young agricultural scientists. Thread reports. While girls of their age were busy with playing, studying and engaging in household work, the three of them assisted farmers of their village to promote organic farming. They demonstrated how, by minimizing the input cost, … Read more
Japan Japan: New collaborations Have Emerged
Spring has come. Under the soft and warm sunlight, Mom’s Lunch-Box Shop, of As-One Community, becomes very busy with orders for local people’s spring events in Suzuka city, Japan. But there is also another reason to be busy this year. Hiroko Katayama / As-One Community Suzuka, representative of GEN-Japan, reports. The members of the As-One-Community are getting busy being guides for the participants of a study-trip. There is a new stream in Japan of people that are facing the real conditions … Read more
Bangladesh Andharmanic Ecovillage, Bangladesh: A Model for Sustainability in Climate Sensitive Regions
Andharmanic village is situated in Khulna district of Bangaldesh, near the Bay of Bengal and beside the biggest mangrove forest ‘Sundorbon’. This village community experienced the very powerful cyclones ‘Sidr’ in 2007, and ‘Aila’ in 2009, which affected the community tremendously. Houses fell down, big trees uprooted, crops were destroyed, domestic animals died, soil and water were polluted by saline water, and many villagers were injured. Today, having incorporated a variety ecovillage … Read more
Gambia Sandele Eco-Retreat / The Gambia - Responsible Tourism
Sandele Eco-Retreat in Kartong is an example of responsible tourism. The lodges are built with compressed, stabilized earth blocks which use a minimum of cement and are frequently stabilized with lime. Electricity, hot water and water pumping are provided using solar and wind power. The Lodges and the Guest Rooms have compost toilets and a constructed wetlands system that minimizes the use of, and purifies, the water flowing from the toilets, showers, hand basins and rainwater. Every step that … Read more
Cameroon Cameroon: Bafut Ecovillage Sparks Entrepreneurship Revolution
About 20 km north of Bemenda, Cameroon, is the village of Bafut, where the traditional "fondom" (kingdom) community living structure remains intact. The goals for the future are ambitious, and inspiring. With the help of matching Permaculture principles with volunteer placements, Better World Cameroon (BWC) http://www.betterworld-cameroon.com is building an African green revolution based on youth, agriculture and environmental conservation. In just two years of linking up with the Global … Read more
ORIGIN Orchestration of Renewable Integrated Generation In Neighborhoods: Connecting Damanhur, Tamera and Findhorn
“ORIGIN is developing a sophisticated intelligent ICT (Information and Communication Technology) system for the management of energy in a community.” (www.origin-energy.eu). The name stands for Orchestration of Renewable Integrated Generation In Neighborhoods, a visionary project with the goal to achieve a more efficient use of the installed renewable energy generation and storage to reduce the amount of “imported energy”, from the public grid, often produced with non-sustainable means. Beatriz … Read more
Ecovillage Boekel Ecovillage Boekel, Netherlands: Ecovillages are Formula 1 Cars - about the cooperation of ecovillages and governments
A key figure in the Dutch government said: "Ecovillages are like Formula 1 cars" after he saw Ad Vlems´ presentation about Ecovillage Boekel, an aspiring member of GEN. The politician used this metaphor because a Formula 1 car is not mainstream, and let’s face it, not everybody wants to live in an ecovillage. But parts of our sustainable way of living will find their way to normal households; growing your own food, sharing cars and tools, biobased building and many more. Just like Formula 1 car, … Read more
Ecological Soil Reactivation Ecological Soil Reactivation and Forest Fire Protection: How to Produce your own Biochar for Terra Preta
In deforested regions with depleted soils farmers are particularly challenged to create and store enough humus to be able to start the reforestation process that will, eventually, protect the land from bush fires, droughts, and desertification. Achim Ecker, living in ZEGG, has experimented with creating Terra Preta for some years. Now he has found a brilliant method to produce biochar and Terra Preta to assist in the challenging South European climate. Almost 20 years ago I bought 7ha of land … Read more
Estonia GEN Estonia celebrates 7 years of eco-life
7 years ago, on the 8th of February in 2008, a group of sustainably minded people founded an organisation called the Network of Estonian Eco-communities, working towards creating a just and ecological Estonia. Today, our biggest achievement is a sustainable and vital ecovillage movement with yearly gatherings and regular communication activities, 2 strong eco-communities, and a Gaia Elementary School. Kadri Allikmäe from Network of Estonian Eco-communities reports. We first hesitated in … Read more
