Permaculture for agroecology: design, movement, practice, and worldview. A review Rafter Ferguson, Sarah Lovell To cite this version: Rafter Ferguson, Sarah Lovell. Permaculture for agroecology: design, movement, practice, and world- view. A review. Agronomy for Sustainable Development, Springer Verlag/EDP Sciences/INRA, 2014, 34 (2), pp.251-274. 10.1007/s13593-013-0181-6. hal-01234801 HAL Id: hal-01234801 https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01234801 Submitted on 27 Nov 2015 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. Agron. Sustain. Dev. (2014) 34:251–274 DOI 10.1007/s13593-013-0181-6 REVIEW ARTICLE Permaculture for agroecology: design, movement, practice, and worldview. A review Rafter Sass Ferguson & Sarah Taylor Lovell Accepted: 17 September 2013 /Published online: 25 October 2013 # INRA and Springer-Verlag France 2013. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com Abstract Agroecology is a promising alternative to industrial is mobilizing diverse forms of social support for sustainability, in agriculture, with the potential to avoid the negative social geographically diverse locations. (5) And scholarship in perma- and ecological consequences of input-intensive production. culture has always been a diverse marginal sector, but is growing. Transitioning to agroecological production is, however, a com- plex project that requires diverse contributions from the outside Keywords Permaculture . Farm design . Perennial of scientific institutions. Agroecologists therefore collaborate polyculture . Agroecological transition . Diversified farming with traditional producers and agroecological movements. systems . Agroecological movement Permaculture is one such agroecological movement, with a broad international distribution and a unique approach to system de- Contents sign. Despite a high public profile, permaculture has remained relatively isolated from scientific research. Though the potential 1. Introduction ................................1 contribution of permaculture to agroecological transition is great, 2. Background ................................3 it is limited by this isolation from science, as well as from oversimplifying claims, and the lack of a clear definition. Here, 2.1 Shifting Definitions ...........................3 we review scientific and popular permaculture literature. A sys- 2.2 Historical Context ............................3 tematic review discusses quantitative bibliometric data, including 2.3 Conceptual Influences .........................3 keyword analysis. A qualitative review identifies and assesses 2.4 Permaculture and Agroecology .................4 major themes, proposals, and claims. The manuscript follows a 3. Review Methods ................................5 stratified definition of permaculture as design system, best prac- 3.1 Systematic Review............................5 tice framework, worldview, and movement. The major points of 3.2 Qualitative Review .........................7 our analysis are as follows: (1) Principles and topics largely 4. Results ....................................7 complement and even extend principles and topics found in the agroecological literature. (2) Distinctive approaches to perennial 4.1 Systematic and Bibliometric Review ...........7 polyculture, water management, and the importance of 4.2 Qualitative Review .........................11 agroecosystem configuration exceed what is documented in the 5. Synthesis .................................16 scientific literature and thus suggest promising avenues of inqui- 5.1 Substantiation and Scholarship ................17 ry. (3) Discussions of practice consistently underplay the com- 5.2 Limitations of this Study .....................18 plexity, challenges, and risks that producers face in developing 5.3 Future Directions ...........................19 diversified and integrated production systems. (4) The movement 6. Conclusion ................................20 R. S. Ferguson (*) 1105 Plant Sciences Laboratory, University of Illinois at 1 Introduction Urbana-Champaign, 1201 S. Dorner Dr., Urbana, IL 61801, USA e-mail: [email protected] Increasing concerns about the negative impacts of industrial agriculture have generated a vigorous debate over the feasi- S. T. Lovell 1009 Plant Sciences Laboratory, University of Illinois at bility of transition to alternative forms of agriculture, capable Urbana-Champaign, 1201 S. Dorner Dr., Urbana, IL 61801, USA of providing a broad suite of ecosystem services while 252 R.S. Ferguson, S.T. Lovell producing yields for human use. The transition to diversified, researchers, stakeholders, and land users. Permaculture con- ecologically benign, smaller scale production systems is tributes to an applied form of ecological literacy (Orr 1992), addressed in the literature of agroecology (De Schutter supplying a popular and accessible synthesis of complex 2010), diversified farming systems (Kremen et al. 2012), socioecological concepts. The design orientation of permacul- and multifunctional agriculture (Wilson 2008). ture offers a distinctive perspective that suggests avenues of Agroecological transition must be regarded as a complex, inquiry in agroecosystem research. Lastly, these factors are multi-sector project, operating at multiple temporal and spatial embodied in an international movement that operates largely scales and involving diverse constituencies (Geels and Kemp outside of the influence and support of large institutions, 2007;Marques2010;Pirauxetal.2010). For this reason, which suggests opportunities for participatory action research researchers have often directed their attention outside of insti- and the mobilization of popular inquiry and support (Méndez tutional science to document the contributions that traditional et al. 2013). and innovative practices offer to the process of transition The potential of permaculture to contribute broadly to agro- (Altieri 2004; Ingram 2007;Rocha2005; Koohafkan et al. ecological transition is limited by several factors. Of primary 2012; Rosset et al. 2011). Alternative agroecology move- importance is the general isolation of permaculture from sci- ments, for example, have been critical in the process of re- ence, both in terms of a lack of scholarly research about perma- gional agroecological transition (Nelson et al. 2009;Altieri culture and neglect within the permaculture literature of con- and Toledo 2011) and likely will be in the future (Fernandez temporary scientific perspectives. This deficit is compounded et al. 2012; Petersen et al. 2012). by overreaching and oversimplifying claims made by move- This paper addresses the alternative agroecology move- ment adherents and the absence of any systematic multisite ment called permaculture and its potential contributions to assessment of permaculture's impacts. Additionally, the difficul- agroecological transition. Permaculture is an international ty of providing a clear and distinguishing description of perma- movement and ecological design system (Fig. 1). Despite culture can cause confusion and hinder rigorous and systematic permaculture's international extent and relatively high public discussion. profile, it has received very little discussion in the scientific The objective of this paper is to contribute to a better literature. The term originated as a portmanteau of permanent understanding of the substance, strengths, and limitations of agriculture and is defined by co-originator David Holmgren as permaculture as a potential contributor to agroecological tran- “Consciously designed landscapes which mimic the patterns sition. Introductory material includes a brief overview of the and relationships found in nature, while yielding an abun- origins and development of permaculture, the growth of the dance of food, fibre and energy for provision of local needs” movement over time, and a preliminary heuristic for compar- (2004, p. xix). As a broadly distributed movement with a ing the prominence and overlap of permaculture and agro- distinctive conceptual framework for agroecosystem design, ecology across several sectors. The introduction is followed permaculture's relevance to the project of agroecological tran- by a systematic review of scientific and popular permaculture sition has several aspects. Permaculture can function as a literature, analyzing publication type, date, and location, topic framework for integrating knowledge and practice across location, scholarly discipline, and citations. Systematic anal- disciplines to support collaboration with mixed groups of ysis also includes quantitative content analysis using a concept ab Fig. 1 Examples of production and education in the permaculture movement. a Small farm with intercropped annuals and perennials, worked partially with hand labor. b Workshop on the design and maintenance of perennial polycultures Permaculture for agroecology: design, practice, movement, and worldview 253 network approach. Qualitative review of the permaculture and appropriate technology (Pursell 1993) emerged as move- framework then