Valken
PROPOSAL
Oude Molen Centre for Alternative Community Development
Direction: Open Research into Ecological Self-Sufficiency Through Community Action
Location: Black River Urban Park/Oude Molen Village
What is an Ecological Self-Sufficient Community?
All community members need to share a common goal:
Self-Sufficiency
- of the community
- of the individual
An Ecological Self-Sufficient Community is one which is able to feed, clothe and shelter its members with minimal dependence on the society in which it is embedded and minimal impact on the environment.
A self-sufficient individual is one who is able to meet the basic needs for human existence (food, clothing, shelter) without depending on a large-scale economic structure to provide these needs via employment or inefficient, centralized governmental social service units funded with taxpayers money (and therefore by employment). This individual still depends on the local community within which s/he is embedded and which depends on his or her co-operation. The individual is free to leave the community, but needs to comply with certain ideals to ensure the success of both the community and themselves.
No community or individual can be completely self-sufficient, but there is a degree of independence from society which can be sought and achieved by a motivated group with a shared set of ideals and complemetary methods of achieving and maintaining these ideals.
A community cannot succeed without the full co-operation of its members, nor can its members succeed without the effective functioning of the community.
A reciprocal interdependence therefore exists between the individual and the community, the success of the community depending on the cohesion of its members. This cohesion creates a synergistic energy which acts in addition to the individual enrgies of the members. The relationship between the parts of a system becomes just as much an entity as the physical components of the system.
"The whole is more than the sum of its parts"- Fritjof Capra
The goal of this community is to showcase the feasibiltiy of small-scale, self-sufficient communities in Africa; to conduct research into alternative technologies and local currency systems designed to break the poverty trap. Once proven, the community will act as a base for the establishment of other communities in areas of extreme poverty and concomitant environmental threat.
Needs Of the Community and the Individuals Within:
Energy
Water
Materials
Currency/Trade
Knowledge
Culture
Health
Technology
Finance/Economic Activity
All are necessary and equally important
A self-sufficient community will require an initial resource input of money, property, skills and personnel.
Once established, the community will become increasingly less reliant on subsidisation as it meets more of its own needs, working as a positive-feedback system. Eventually, the successful community will be able to export surplus products to trade with other communities and subsidise satellite communities in other areas.
The community is open to any individual with money or skills or just the motivation to be able to provide for themselves.
New members are entitled to food, shelter and clothing and any other needs (eg. medical treatment)
The members are then free to choose the method by which they are to contribute to the community and justify their membership.
They can:
give the community cash to cover their needs (ie. if they have a job outside of the community, but still wish to enjoy the benefits of and ecological lifestyle).
use a skill to contribute to the community
learn a skill while doing unskilled work
work as an apprentice
do unskilled work until ready to choose a skill to learn
As each community member masters a skill, s/he will be able to operate at a new level within the community, allowing another member to occupy the vacated level, so there is a constant upward movement of people through the community.
Training can be done on an apprentice-contract basis, where the trainer is a trainee for a new level, and needs to train his/her replacement(s) whilst being trained, and so on to the next level. This makes training a personal matter, the trainee being instructed by a person involved in the exact task being learned.
Skills learned within the community need to be recognised outside of the community as well, allowing freedom of movement into and out of the community.
Individuals are free to leave the community at any time, even if they have gained more then they have provided, but will be required to redress this imbalance to rejoin the community at a later stage.
Energy Production:
The global energy crisis requires constant, urgent research into alternative energy production.
Valkenberg can act as a testing-ground for various energy-production techniques.
Academic Institutions, Industry and Governmental Departments can be invited to set up experimental small-scale power stations utilising: wind, solar, hydro-electric and biomass electricity generation.
Research into energy efficiency can be conducted at the same time.
The aim is to direct energy production away from large-scale, grid-based production, requiring massive power stations and hundreds of kilometers of expensive, unsightly pylons and high-tension cabling.
Renewable energy can be produced efficiently and reliably on a small scale to supply a community. The community is then actively responsible for its own energy production and consumption, rather than passively expecting a faceless, centralised institution to supply power in exchange for cash.
This will initially require funding and human and material resources. But, as power and research results are generated and the generators are made more efficient through research and development, the positive feedback cycle takes effect and the power generators will eventually produce a surplus of power at lower cost, which can be stored or traded.
Food Production:
Techniques exist which allow crops to be grown very quickly using minimal space, soil and water. These techniques include permaculture, hydroponics and tunnel farming, amongst others, and are relatively inexpensive in the long run, when compared to the losses incurred through traditional farming methods.
The aim is to achieve high-yield, low-area, low-water use agriculture by controlling and optimising growing conditions, therefore reducing the crop dependency on seasonal variation and rainfall. Exotic plants can therefore be grown effectively and safely (without affecting indigenous flora and fauna through cross-pollenation and pest control) and plants to be grown out of season, regardless of the local climate.
Research into organic fertilizer includes using techniques to economically and safely turn human waste into fertilizer, using thermophilic composting. This addresses two issues: the disposal of human waste and the environmental degredation caused by the use of artificial fertilizers.
More research can be conducted on free-range animal husbandry and fish, mollusc and shellfish farming.
Being able to produce all of its own food, without having to depend on centralised, large scale "factory farms" and food-processing and distribution organisations once again brings the community closer to the source of its needs and makes it accountable for its impact on its surroundings.
Recycling:
Research into effective recycling methods include efficient collection from households by manufacturing and providing households with compartmentalised bins, so that refuse is automatically seperated.
Organic refuse is used to generate methane and fertilizer
Metal, plastic and glass is sold back to manufacturers.
Obsolete equipment such as computers can be recycled to provide basic computer services for educational purposes. Companies could be persuaded to donate their obsolete equipment rather than dumping or recycling. Restoring equipment could provide important skills training .
Clothing:
Intensive hemp farming can provide enough fibre to manufacture fabric for clothing and linen
Small-scale (cottage industry) clothing production provides a means of support for community members, and affordable, good quality clothing for the community.
Import of non-hemp materials must be balanced by export of manufactured clothing.
Water:
There is major water wastage and pollution from current large-scale sewage-treatment systems. Dry-composting toilets and thermophilic composting produce useful fertilizer as well as reduce water wastage and pollution.
Raised vegetable beds and covered agriculture allow water recapture.
Rainwater collection per household helps reduce the community’s overall consumption.
Research into water conservation, purification and recycling methods.
Local Currency:
Exchange of goods or sevices between community members, regulated by conventional or local currency system.
Community members with no access to cash are still able to function in the community via a system of favours, agreements and individual contracts based on mutual trust and respect.
The penalty for breaking an agreement is loss of the respect and trust of the rest of the community, leaving cash as the only means of exchange.
"Survival of the co-existent"
The value of a service or product offered by a community member is measured by the number of members who are beneficially affected, divided by the number of members required to produce the service/product.
For example;
If 10 members are required to buy, build and maintain a wind-turbine which supplys 20 households of 4-6 people with electricity for a year,
then the benefit is 100/10, meaning that the 20 households (consisting of an average of five people per household - 100 people) can support the 10 energy-providers by providing the goods, services or cash they require to continue providing energy for the householders. (The numerical values used in this example are for illustrative purposes only, exact numerical values cannot be applied to such concepts, as the law of averages will ensure that everybody benefits in the long run.)
This mutual co-operation makes the exchange of goods and services a personal contract between the two sub-communities. If the terms of the contract are broken by any one participant, then the entire system breaks down and the culprit needs to toe the line or leave the system.
The exact nature and quantity of the goods/services exchanged depends on what each member can currently afford. Some more affluent members may need to provide more than others. Later, those who received help will be able to support themselves and eventually help another less affluent member.
It is very important in an exchange system of this nature that financial records and lists of exchanges are not kept, nor any quantitative numerical value assigned to a product or service (unless it is to be exchanged outside of the system, in which case, the costs and profits are to be shared equally by the community). This may sound strange to ears accustomed to capitalist exchange, but is logical when applied to this situation. The exchange occurs within a group of consenting participants. Every participant benefits from the system to some degree or another. Those in a position to provide capital for the purchase of expensive materials (eg. Wind Turbines) are then not in a position to claim an equal amount of goods and services back from other participants. (The purchase of expensive items can actually be absorbed by the entire community on a co-operative basis). All participants agree that what they bring to the system becomes part of the system, accessible to all. Participants provide what they can, when they can, without holding back something for themselves, because they know and trust the other participants and have their needs provided for by the system.
So, no one member has more or less than any other member, but all have their needs provided for by the system. If any one member thrives, then the system thrives as a result. By consenting to join such a system, participants eliminate the possibility of extreme personal wealth (experience will testify to the negative effects this has on people) and extreme poverty in any part of the system. Your motivation for success is no longer the accumulation of personal capital, but the success of the community, of which you are a member.
An exchange system based on mutual trust and respect, ignoring the exact quantity and value of any one member’s contribution, (as this is balanced out in the long run) allows any one participant the dignity of being able to offer all participants something in return through their contribution to the system.
It must be stressed that this type of exchange system will only work in small communities of around 100 members. Carl Marx had a similar idea, except that he tried to apply it to large groups of individuals, each with his/her own agenda, with a central regulatory body to enforce his principles, naturally, it didn’t work.
For this exchange system to work on a large scale, multiple local currencies would need to interact and exchange goods and services, which each local currency system would need to specialise in. For example, a community with a windfarm could trade power with another specialising in transportation. The two communities interact at the level of power and transpotation, but remain independent and self-sufficient at other levels. (This may not be necessary, but serves to show that a degree of complexity can be introduced to local currency systems, although it is more desirable to keep them as simple as possible).
Knowledge:
Community-based schools for both children and adults.
Emphasis on verbal and computer literacy, achieved by using recycled obsolete computers to teach. Cheaper and more effective than textbooks and blackboards.
Cheaper, easier and more environmetally-sound to recycle computers than to buy textbooks and write on paper.
Visitors can attend courses on all aspects of self-sufficiency, with the aim of equipping them with the skills to start a self-sufficient community in another area.
Energy, agriculture, construction experiments provide valuable knowledge and research data.
Major emphasis is on training pioneer groups to set up self-sufficient communities in other areas. A community cannot function effectively if it gets too large. As soon as a community reaches a critical mass, a representative group of the most experienced members needs to voluntarily leave the community and establish a satellite community in areas where they are needed.
Culture:
Studios: Art, music, craft, etc.
Workshops: Cottage industries
Market: Allows the self-sufficient community to exchange goods with the public for cash to purchase what the community cannot provide. Important that this source of income is not too heavily relied upon and that all cash earned goes back into the system as a part of the trader’s contribution.
Art: Galleries, Exhibitions, etc
Music: Festivals, raves, gigs, etc. (to bring the public into contact with an alternative way of life which they may not have known about.)
Health:
Clinics specialising in Holistic/Alternative/Eastern healing as well as conventional healing methods for the treatment of physical and mental illness and addicition.
Shelters for the homeless and for orphaned/abused children and abused women and their children.
Technology:
University experiments, company-funded eco-labs, Government research.
Research into alternative energy production
Research into efficient building, agriculture, recycling, energy and water use, etc.
(see Manifesto by A. Horn)
Finance:
The money required to fund a project like this would have to come from institutions like the UN, Aid organizations, fundraising industries, the Government, ecologically-unsound industries wanting positive media exposure and the actual participants themselves.
The cash can also be generated through viable enterprises, such as mail-order commerce, e-commerce, markets, restaurants, etc. All enterprises will have to follow ecological principles, and serve as the financial interface between the community and the socioeconomic context.
Whatever money is introduced to the system, from whatever source, goes into a central pool fund, to be utilised for the benefit of the community as a whole.
The purchase of expensive equipment or the construction of buildings needs to be approached co-operatively, with each community member contributing to the construction of all buildings, either directly or by supporting the builders. Eventually, all community members have accommodation.
The reciprocity of the individual relationships in the community eliminates the need for a centralized service-provider. ie. medical services, social services, security, refuse collection, road-maintenance, etc. is provided by the community. Therefore the Government has no reason to impose taxes on the community members, as long as they remain as such.
An individual requiring care for a disability or injury, who cannot actively return what they receive, will be cared for by the community because their past and future participation in the system entitles them to receive care. Even those who are extensively disabled still have something to give the community which supports them. This feeling of usefulness is extremely therapeutic to the individual and useful to the community.
Implementation
The concepts outlined above are not unrealistic, utopian daydreams. Communities like this prospered all over the world before the industrial revolution and global economy. In many parts of the world, especially those suffering from poverty, informal local currencies exist successfully and serve to bind communites by the trust and reciprocity they require to operate.
There are countless self-sufficient communities in Europe, North America, Australia and other industrialised countries, consisting of enlightened people who have realised that a consumptive lifestyle results in the breakdown of the community and the isolation of the individual from everything except his/her job and commercialised entertainment. People who felt trapped by society and helpless to prevent the relentless devastation of the very planet they exist on to allow the consumptive lifestyle they were forced to lead. These people chose an alternative lifestyle which improved the quality of their lives by giving them an equal role to play in the community on which they depended and which depended on them. They also became responsible for the energy they used, the food they ate, the clothes they wore and the houses they lived in. This responsibility gave them control over the way in which these needs were met: environmental impact, food additives, crop pest control, animal husbandry, etc., etc., allowing them to DO something about the damage the earth is suffering instead of giving money to inefficient organisations and hoping that something gets done.
These communities are made of people with a common goal: to live in harmony with one another and the environment they so completely depend upon. These are enlightened people of conscience, who give without expecting equal or greater personal reward, other than the benefit of the community (and themselves as members)
These communities are eager to promote self sufficiency in the parts of the world which really need it, Africa being a top priority. They can and will all contribute to the establishment and maintenance of a self-sufficient community at the Black River site, as a starting point for other communities around the country and, eventually, throughout Africa.
The community at Oude Molen will not be a truly self-sufficient community in the sense outlined above. It is intended to be a showcase for these ideas, a research site, a training centre and a resource centre for satellite communities.
It will be a place for Capetonians and Tourists to visit and witness that these principals can and do exist and work effectively.
Visitors will be able to buy products of the residents at flea markets which do not compete with other markets in Cape Town and specialise in products produced by individuals on a small-scale to subsidise the community in which they live.
Restaurants offer food grown on the property, using ecological agricultural and cooking methods.
Visitors interested in finding out more about leading ecological lifestyles will be able to attend courses or purchase products such as solar panels, greywater recycling systems, wind turbines, etc.
Venues for music events and art exhibitions attract and entertain visitors of all ages.
A large part of the visit will be to witness alternative technology at work. Wind turbines, permaculture, cob houses, Earthships, etc. will be witnessed by the visitor and shown to actually work.
Community residents will be "on display" (without infringing on their privacy) as well, allowing visitors to see that people can live sustainably.
Valkenburg will be a showcase for sustainable development. Media coverage as well as visitors will help suggest to the public that there is an alternative to the consumptive lifestyle they are currently forced to accept.
The owners of the land on which Valkenberg is located need to realise that their assets are far more valuable than the market value assigned to them. A sustainable development will be more profitable in the long run than any short term, high capital development , such as a mall, office blocks or high-density housing scheme. The size of the population benefited by sustainable development over a long period is far greater than the few wealthy developers who stand to make a killing by purchasing assets from desperate sellers.
It is imperative that the Oude Molen/Black River Park area be zoned for low-impact development. Province will then not be able to sell the property for the price they want and will be more inclined to heed the demand for sustainable development. I believe that if the Cape Metropolitan Council and the Cape Provincial Administration can be convinced that this area can be sustainably, and even profitably, developed over a long period of time, the main beneficiaries being the disadvantaged masses which put such strain on the economy, then Oude Molen can be the seed from which a self-sufficient, ecologically sound continent can flourish.
September 30, 2003 in Eco Worrier